


Last Tango in Poplar

by 30secondfics



Category: Call the Midwife
Genre: Angst, Drama, F/F, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Love, Reconciliation, lesbian wedding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-10
Updated: 2019-06-18
Packaged: 2019-06-25 13:21:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 32,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15641595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/30secondfics/pseuds/30secondfics
Summary: “I sometimes feel as if we’re ghosts—half with each other, but mostly without. I think it would be easier to do what everyone’s so bloody insistent on and get married, and just accept that... you and I can never be.” In 1960, Delia Busby could no longer bear having a secret lover. She leaves Patsy at The Silver Buckle that cold night and marries a man three months later. The day of the wedding, Patsy accepts a job in Bristol and runs away, never looking back and never forgiving herself for not having the courage to fight for love.Fifty years later, Patsy and Delia reconnect through a website called Facebook.Inspired by the show Last Tango in Halifax.





	1. Chapter 1

~ London, 2010 ~

Patsy Mount glanced at her watch and eagerly watched the doors of the old tea house. She tapped her red varnished nails against the white tablecloth beneath her hand and attempted to calm her nerves with positive thoughts. She was going to see someone, someone who was once very important to her, after fifty years apart. It was exciting yet daunting. After all, she was about to face the woman she felt she had failed so many years ago.

At fifteen minutes past the hour, Patsy began to worry. She pulled out her smartphone to double check that she was at the right place at the right time, even though she was certain she was. She scrolled through the short chain of messages to check again and again.

_Delia Wallace: Hello there, are you the same Patsy Mount who was a midwife at Nonnatus House?_

_Patsy Mount: I am. Were you formerly Delia Busby?_

She asked because she didn’t recognize the surname. The profile picture was of a small garden, blooming with fresh flowers.

_Delia Wallace: Yes! Pats, it’s me! I can’t believe I found you on here!_

Patsy recalled the jolt of excitement she received upon reading the message.

_Patsy Mount: How have you been?_

A heavy question for someone to answer after fifty years of radio silence.

_Delia Wallace: I’m doing alright for an old thing._

_Patsy Mount: That’s good to hear._

Patsy didn’t hear from Delia for almost two days after she sent that message. She wondered if that was the end of their conversation (though she hoped not) or if Delia suddenly became too busy to continue their chat.

_Delia Wallace: Would you like to meet for afternoon tea one Sunday? I would love to catch-up in person._

Patsy could not refuse.

“Pats?”

It had been fifty years but the voice called her name much the same way.

“Patience Mount, is that you?”

“Delia Bu--Wallace...” Patsy stood from her seat to greet her date. Bright eyes, black hair, dimpled smile. The woman standing before her was certainly an older version of the Delia she once knew.

“I’m sorry, I haven’t got a cellphone, otherwise I would have told you I was running late---it’s good to see you!” Delia mirrored the smile on Patsy’s face, “You look good… fit.”

Patsy blushed and took a seat when Delia took hers. “You look good too,” she complemented with restrain. Truth be told, she thought Delia looked bodacious at the rightful age of seventy-three. Delia looked her age, maybe even a little older, but she had aged like fine wine. “Your hair... it’s still nice and black.”

“Your hair, it’s still red!” Delia laughed.

“I get it done,” Patsy gave her a guilty smile.

“So do I,” Delia blushed.

“I hope peppermint tea and cucumber sandwiches are okay. You still like those, right?”

“I do. I’m sorry I’m late, the tube is just ghastly at this time.”

“I’m sorry you had a rough commute, I would have gladly picked a place closer to you.”

“Don’t be silly, you came all the way from Bristol!” Delia waved her hand in the air to brush off the woman’s words. “I’m grateful you agreed to meet me with your busy schedule. Professor Mount, you are now.”

“Oh please,” Patsy blushed, “Only my students call me that.” She suddenly felt conscious for putting her work information on her Facebook profile.

“Well, I was so happy when my daughter taught me how to use that search engine. I typed your name in and you were one of three profiles to come up. Did you know there’s a Patsy Mount in Kissimmee, Florida?”

Patsy smirked. “I didn’t know it was you, at first,” she admitted shyly. “Your profile picture is of your garden. I didn’t recognise your surname but I saw that Trixie Dockerill was our common friend, and I thought: how many Delia’s could she know?”

The smile on Delia’s face had yet to fade. “I’m sure you’ve seen some of my other pictures on that Facebook... I’m a great grandmother now.”

“I saw, congratulations!”

Their peppermint tea and cucumber sandwiches were delivered and they happily began to consume them.

“How about you?” Delia asked, taking a sip of her tea. “You don’t have many pictures, but I see you have a dog.”

“My girl, Coco,” Patsy nodded.

“You’ve also won quite a few awards, Lifetime Achievement Awards and Women’s Empowerment Merits-”

“That’s not on Facebook...” Patsy thought out loud, “Did you google me?”

“Guilty as charged,” Delia bat her eyes. The same eyes that Patsy used to look for in a crowd. Eyes now marked with lines and wisdom.

Patsy blushed. She had had a lot of time to kill in the past fifty years, and excelling in her work was a rewarding pastime.

“Have you got any grandchildren?” Delia proceeded to ask, subtly questioning if Patsy ever got married after all these years.

“No children,” Patsy shook her head, her shoulder-length hair moving freely. It had been decades since she had it pinned up and lacquered in a beehive. “I never got around to getting married.”

“I see.”

“But tell me more about yours!” Patsy insisted. She truly wanted to hear more about Delia. She couldn’t stop thinking about her since Delia sent her that friend request and message. She must have been easier to find, since she had the same name. Delia Busby was nowhere to be found on the internet since she took her husband’s name, fifty years earlier.

Delia smiled and told Patsy about her eldest, Lucy, a policewoman. Lucy had a daughter named Rosie, who just had a baby, Delia’s great granddaughter called Poppy. After Lucy was a son called Peter, a real estate agent in Canada, and Delia’s youngest child, Tim, who was the only one to follow in her footsteps and become a nurse.

“That’s wonderful!” Patsy smiled, “My doctor is a woman and her nurse is a man. Could you imagine the uproar if we saw that in Poplar back in the day?”

“I’m so glad we’ve evolved,” Delia agreed. “There’s so many things that are considered normal now that would have been absolutely taboo in our days… my Lucy is a single mother.”

“Do any of your boys have children?”

“Yes, Peter and Martha have a son called Steven. They live in Vancouver—that’s where his Martha was assigned to the MOV. She’s a curator.”

“You and your children have done well. How’s your husband?” Patsy dared to ask. She noticed he hadn’t been mentioned yet.

“He passed in 2008,” Delia said sadly. “Prostate cancer. He took such good care of me and the kids, but he was such a slacker when it came to his own health. By the time he fessed up to having troubles down there, it was too late.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“We miss him,” Delia admitted.

“I can imagine.”

“But what about you?” Delia changed the topic, “What happened to you, after Nonnatus?”

“Well,” Patsy took a deep breath, “I don’t know if you heard, but I took a midwife position at Bristol Hosp-”

“I remember,” Delia made it known that she never forgot the day Patsy left. “It was the day of my wedding... you didn’t show up.”

Patsy lowered her eyes onto the cup of tea in front of her. “It would have been too hard to watch you marry someone else...” she slowly tapped her nails against her teacup, a sure tell sign that her nerves had returned. She suddenly wanted a cigarette--for the first time in thirty years.

“You disappeared...” Delia said sadly, “You didn’t even leave an address so I could write you.”

“It didn’t feel right to write to a married woman,” Patsy admitted.

“I so wanted to send you an apology, Pats. I wanted to clear the air, at the very least. I didn’t want our last real conversation to be that dispute we had at the coffee shop.”

“I still kick myself for not running after you that night,” Patsy confessed.

Delia sighed and, after a moment of silence, said, “I’m sorry I ran off that night. I was young... and I chose what was easy instead of fighting to be with the person I really wanted to spend my life with.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t put up much of a fight either. I should have told you that we’d find a way to be together someway, somehow.”

“I shouldn’t have gave up on us too soon. If I had known our love wouldn’t be illegal forever... I would have endured the secrecy.”

“I think the same thing,” Patsy said sadly. “But we’re here now, and you’ve got the family you wanted-”

“Patsy, you know as well as I do how much I had to give up to have a family of my own.”

“I know,” Patsy avoided the woman’s eyes. “But you were happy, right?”

“As happy as I could have been with a man.”

Patsy wasn’t sure she knew exactly what that meant.

“He really loved me, and I love him for that, bless his heart. But even he knew I was living against my own grain.”

“He knew?” Patsy asked, surprised.

“Of course he knew the kind of woman I was, Patsy. I wouldn’t lie to my own husband. He fancied me so much, he said he knew I could never love him the way that I loved you, but he vowed to give me a home, and children, and that we’d make the most of what God gave us.”

“He knew about me?”

“I came clean, three months into our courtship, and he still wanted to marry me.”

“That’s love,” Patsy agreed. She couldn’t blame him, Delia was a catch. She just wished it was her who was able to give Delia that life, so many years ago.

“Surely you’ve found love in these past fifty years...” Delia countered.

“There were many companions… perhaps too many,” Patsy admitted, “But nobody stuck around for more than a decade.”

“I’m sorry.”

“What for?”

“To hear that.”

“Well,” Patsy shrugged. Not everyone was good at playing the game of love.

Delia gave the woman a sad smile and placed her hand on the one Patsy had on the table.

“You were my best friend, Pats… it broke my heart when Trixie told me you’d ran away.”

Patsy felt tears pool in her eyes, but she was able to contain herself, as she always did in public. She had so many years to recover from her break-up with Delia. So much time had passed that she convinced herself she was completely over it. Yet, opening old wounds made her realize she needed real closure to heal. Delia granted her that much needed closure by meeting with her in person.

“I’ve wanted to have this conversation with you for so long,” Delia sighed. “I wanted you to know that I didn’t do what I did to spite you, but rather, because I was too naive to fight for you.”

“I never thought that you got married out of spite,” Patsy reassured, a tear trickling down her cheek. She knew Delia wanted a spouse and a family, and those were things she could not give her fifty years ago.

“Oh, Pats…” Delia frowned and withdrew her hand to look for a handkerchief in her purse.

“Thank you,” Patsy couldn’t help but chuckle at the pretty pink handkerchief Delia offered her.

“Does this clear the air between us a little?” Delia asked softly.

Patsy nodded her head. “I’m glad we’ve talked about it. I’ve had to suppress a lot of anger and regret... for a long time.”

“I know, you were always good at that.”

“I should have left an address, so we could have had closure sooner-”

“There’s no use moping about what we should have done differently,” Delia soothed. “What’s been done is done and I’m glad we got to clear the air after that dreadful night.”

“Me too,” Patsy sighed in relief.

They simmered into comfortable silence. Delia’s hand returned to comforting the one Patsy had on the table, and Patsy felt fifty years of agony, agony she had buried in the deepest parts of her brain, extinguish.

“So tell me more about what happened to you after you left Poplar…” Delia encouraged, genuinely interested.

“Well…” Patsy paused to recall the events of her life after she ran away from the east end. “My father… remember he lived in Hong Kong? He passed away in ‘62 and I stayed there for a year. I thought I could take over his business but it turned out I was not meant to be a shipbroker. So I sold the company and moved back to Bristol.”

“You must be wealthy.”

“I’m comfortable.”

“Did you go back to midwifery?”

“For a bit. Then less and less women had home births and I decided to work in intensive care while I got my bachelors degree---which then turned into a master’s degree, then a PhD. I started teaching at Bristol University a few years after I graduated and, as you know, I still work there today. I could have retired a decade ago, but I love it too much. My students… I’ve grown fond of them and working keeps me busy and out of trouble.”

“You’ve done a lot with your career… Doctor Mount,” Delia sang the title with a proud smirk.

“You’ve done a lot with your family,” Patsy smiled, a hint of sadness in her grin. Hearing about Delia’s family made her feel that she had missed out on having a family of her own.

“Have you kept in contact with any of the Nonnatus girls?” Delia asked.

“I used to send Trixie Christmas cards, but you know how the times went… all of the sudden people stopped writing and sending letters. I have her on Facebook, like I said. We comment on each other’s pictures from time to time.” Patsy took a sip of her tea, “What about you?”

“Well, I ended up moving to Poplar, John being a Poplar man and all. We lived in a flat by the community center until they laid him off, so I saw the midwives and nurses quite often around the neighbourhood. Actually, Barbara Gilbert—Barbara Hereward, she’s now called—delivered my Lucy. Then John got laid off and it was hard for him to find work since there was less and less of a demand for dockworkers. We moved to Stratford, for a bit, while he did contract work as a bricklayer. But he found a job as a house framer at the new development and we ended up back in Poplar again.”

“I forgot about dear old Barbara,” Patsy smiled and made a mental note to see if she could find her on Facebook later. “Did you keep working?” she wanted to know if Delia became a housewife.

“I tried to,” Delia answered honestly. “But with three children, being a mother became a fulltime job. I didn’t work for almost a decade. I didn’t go back to Male Surgical until Tim started school. I ended up retiring there in 2003.”

“What do you do now?”

“Be a great grandmother, I suppose. I mostly stay at home--my garden keeps me busy, as you can see. We bought the house in ‘64, it’s just a couple of blocks north of Nonnatus, at a new development—well, it’s not new now. It was then.” Delia took a bite of her cucumber sandwich and wiped her mouth with the white cotton napkin, “Whereabouts Bristol are you?”

“I have a house in Clifton, but I’m in London quite often. I teach lectures and run workshops at King’s College so I have a flat in Chelsea as well.”

“They must cost a fortune.”

Patsy ignored the comment and ate her sandwich. “Would you come visit sometime?” she asked bravely.

Delia gave her a small smile, “That would be nice.”

“How about this Friday?” Patsy thought she might have been too forward and added, “I have a lecture here in London. I can make us dinner after?”

Delia paused in thought. “I’ll have to see if Lucy can drive me,” she answered honestly.

“Do you still drive?” Patsy recalled Delia being one of the few nurses at the home who had a driver’s license and no car. She remembered Delia telling her how her father taught her how to drive when she was only fourteen in Pembrokeshire. Now that Patsy thought about it, she vaguely remembered Delia teaching one of the nurses how to drive, using a rounded pillow as a steering wheel and three loafers as the pedals.

“I did… until I got into a car accident three years ago.”

“Oh no… were you badly hurt?”

“I hit my head pretty bad and I couldn’t remember much, for a month, and I had seizures… so I can’t get my license back unless I go a full year without having a spell. My last one was six months ago, so I’m hoping I can go another six.”

“Oh… I can send a cab for you...” Patsy offered. She realized her tone made her sound so desperate and she tried to save her ego, “I won a taxi voucher at a faculty raffle and I’d hate to see it go to waste.”

“We’ll see what Lucy’s schedule is like. I’ll send you a message on that Facebook? I’ve been getting better at typing. My Lucy has a laugh when she sees me type because I pound on the keys so hard. She says, ‘mum, it’s not a typewriter!’”

Patsy laughed, for the first time since sitting down.

“Well, I’d love to have you over for dinner. It’s been lovely revisiting old memories with you.”

Delia sighed in happy agreement, “I’ve had a wonderful time revisiting them with you too.”

000

“Who is this woman again?” Lucy asked. She had just finished work and was now driving her mother to Chelsea, London. In the back of a cop car. Like a criminal.

“A colleague from nursing school,” Delia answered.

“What kind of nurses can afford to live in Chelsea?” Lucy’s work partner, a policewoman named Sasha, asked from the passenger’s seat.

“Well, she’s a professor now,” Delia explained. “Plus, her father was a wealthy shipbroker.”

“Lucky lass,” Sasha nodded in approval.

“Is this it?” Lucy drove them to the building and parked the car on the road by the main entrance.

Delia lowered her head to look at the number on top of the main door. “It must be...”

“It sure is posh,” Lucy whistled, gazing up at the clean white Victorian building.

“You have to tell us what it looks like on the inside,” Sasha commented.

Delia rolled her eyes at the fuss and opened the door.

“I’ll pick you up around nine, alright?” Lucy reminded, “Call me a half hour before so I know when to leave.”

“I will.”

“Be good,” Lucy teased her mother.

“Go on, off with you!” Delia laughed and stepped out of the car. The doorman greeted her a good evening and opened the big glass door for her.

The building _was_ posh. There was no other word to describe it. It was certainly an upgrade from the homes they had in Poplar.

“Good evening, how may I help you?” A security guard asked at the front desk.

“I’m here to see…” she glanced at the piece of paper that she scribbled Patsy’s address on, “Flat number 6.”

“Your name, please?”

“Delia Wallace.”

“One moment, please.” The security guard picked up the phone and said, “Doctor Mount, Delia Wallace is here. Certainly.” He hung up the phone and walked around his station to approach Delia. “Right this way…”

Delia followed him to one of three elevators and stepped inside when it opened for her. The security guard tapped his keycard against a black portal and pressed the sixth button for her.

“Have a good evening,” he said.

“Thanks, you too!” Delia smiled and glanced up at the digital box that flashed the floor numbers. When the door opened, she stepped out and furrowed her brows. First, in confusion, and then in awe. Where she expected to see a hallway studded with doors, she instead saw a grand foyer. She realized it was the penthouse unit and it took up the entirety of the storey.

In the center of the foyer was a round table, topped with green aged-copper figurines. They were abstract and Delia took a moment to decipher their meaning.

“Deels?”

Delia turned her head towards the voice, her body still bent at the waist and her big old bottom prominently sticking out.

“Admiring the Theos, are we?”

“The whos?” Delia furrowed her brows.

“Andrew Theo. He’s the artist who sculpted those.”

“Right,” Delia straightened-up and smiled, “What exactly are they?”

“Lord knows,” Patsy smirked, “But they were a gift from the National Ballet. They might be ballerinas, if gravity shifted and their particles spun outwards.”

“What does one have to do to get a gift from the National Ballet?” Delia wondered.

“Be a loyal sponsor.” Patsy approached the woman and offered her elbow, “May I offer you a drink, Missus Wallace?” she asked properly.

Delia smirked and took the elbow Patsy offered, “You may.”

Patsy took Delia deeper into the flat and into the kitchen where wines and a cheese board awaited. Delia thought it funny that Patsy, who used to drink endless cocktails with her at the nurse’s home, had also immersed herself into wine culture. Delia hadn’t had a cocktail in years either.

“White or red?” Patsy asked.

“Red.”

Patsy smiled and poured the woman a glass of red wine.

“Spicy sausage rigatoni or shrimp alfredo?”

“Ooh...” Delia pursed her lips in thought, “Sausage.”

“I should have known,” Patsy teased with a smirk, “You love sausage now.”

Delia dropped her jaw in shock, and then laughed out loud.

Patsy laughed along and turned away to begin gathering fresh ingredients from the refrigerator.

“Let me help,” Delia began to open a cupboard, but Patsy’s voice stopped her.

“No,” Patsy held her hands up to indicate she wanted Delia to stop. “I’m cooking you dinner. I said I would.”

“I can chop a few vegetables, it won’t be a bother.”

“Nope,” Patsy firmly shook her head. “Your job is to take a seat and keep me company.”

“Well…” Delia smirked and took a seat on one of the eight bar stools that lined up under the breakfast bar, “I can’t object to a pretty woman making me dinner.”

Patsy smiled and began to work on their meal.

Delia glanced around the open-concept flat and noticed the various pieces of art on the walls. Most of them were abstract. Delia thought Patsy must be fond of them, if she had so many pieces around her home. It was a part of Patsy Delia didn’t know, or perhaps Patsy had yet to develop her love for art when they were together.

One of the paintings on the wall appeared to be a naked man and it made Delia laugh in her head.

“For the record…” Delia started, “I have an acquired taste for the occasional sausage… but I’m not in love with sausages.”

“Oh really?” Patsy arched an eyebrow.

“I didn’t think I would like it, at first,” Delia admitted. “But it helps… if you at least _like_ the gentleman serving the sausage.”

“Oh god,” Patsy winced in disgust and then laughed.

“For the record,” Delia laughed along.

“Note taken,” Patsy snort.

“Have you ever tried it?” Delia wondered.

“Not now, not ever,” Patsy shook her head in denial.

“Note taken,” Delia smiled and took a sip of her wine. She helped herself to some cheese and crackers, and kept up the conversations as Patsy made their meal. She had forgotten how easy Patsy was to talk to. They used to talk about everything and anything, and Delia learned that they still could, even after fifty years apart. They talked, and talked, from conversations about their favourite television shows, to a debate on ocean versus sea exploration. It was so easy.

000

“This was just beautiful, Pats…” Delia complimented.

“I hope it tasted good too,” Patsy chuckled.

“Not just the food,” Delia confessed. “Sitting with you… with this view… and talking... I’d forgotten how easy it was to talk to you.”

“We used to talk a lot,” Patsy reminisced.

“We could talk for hours about anything and everything,” Delia agreed.

Patsy sighed and gazed out of her windows, watching the west end of the city where she and Delia used to run off to have dinner, or see a film, or even go shopping on the odd day when they had an extra pound to spend.

“We used to have fun, just you and me,” Patsy smiled.

“We had lots of fun.”

“You were my favourite person to explore the city with.”

“You were my favourite person, period.” Delia reached across the table to take hold of Patsy’s hand. “You filled my heart with so much joy… now I wonder how that stopped being enough, fifty years ago.”

Patsy took Delia’s hand into her own and gave Delia’s knuckle a soft kiss. She had done what Delia said at the tea house and stopped moping about what could have been done differently. Instead of looking back at all of her regrets, she began to put her energy towards the future.

“Delia, would you accompany me to my bedroom?”

“Oh, Pats…” Delia widened her eyes, unsure if she was ready for what Patsy wanted.

“Nothing like that,” Patsy reassured when she saw the worried look on Delia’s face. “I want to show you something.”

“O-okay,” Delia nodded her head and followed Patsy into her bedroom. Patsy took her into the enormous walk-in closet and began to rummage through her belongings in search for something.

“Here it is…” Patsy stood up with the small shoebox in her hands. She removed the lid and moved the bottle of perfume aside to pick out two photographs.

“Patience Mount…” Delia gasped when she saw the old black and white photos. One was of her twenty-year-old self in her nursing school uniform, and the other was of her and Patsy at the Poplar Community Centre Square Dance. “You kept them...” Delia said in awe.

“I don’t throw away memories.” Patsy admitted, “Especially happy ones.”

“Look how young we were,” Delia smiled.

“Do you remember what you said to me that night?” Patsy asked.

“I probably said too many things, the chatterbox I was,” Delia laughed.

Patsy chuckled in agreement. “You said… you wanted to dance with me. I said there wasn’t a place in the world that we could, and you said… until we found a place where we could dance together, we would have to dance together in our heads.”

“I remember now,” Delia recalled.

“Delia Wallace…” Patsy placed the memory box on a nearby shelf, “Would it be too late to ask you to dance with me?”

Delia blushed. “In the closet?” she chuckled.

“Foxtrot or waltz?” Patsy took her phone out of her pocket and began to search for music.

“How ‘bout a tango?” Delia teased.

Patsy tapped the play icon on her phone and tucked it, speaker-up, in her back pocket. The music began to play and Patsy placed her hands on Delia’s shoulders before spinning her around, to face away from her.

“Pats,” Delia gasped and whimpered when Patsy’s breath brushed her ear.

“We’ve waited fifty years for this...” Patsy smiled and snaked her arm around Delia’s torso so she could place a flat hand on Delia’s navel.

“That is a long time...” Delia placed a hand on top of the one Patsy had on her stomach, her other hand naturally taking the hand Patsy held out to the side.

Patsy lifted her left foot and swayed them to the left, taking four steps before stopping abruptly to spin Delia around to face her. Delia gasped again. Patsy held the small of Delia’s back, her other hand pointed straight ahead, towards the direction she wanted to go. Slow. Quick. Quick. Quick. Their feet stepped to the music. One. Two. Three. Four. Patsy gently guided Delia where she wanted to go, and didn’t stumble on her feet, not once.

Delia always knew Patsy was a great dancer, but she was surprised she hadn’t lost her touch.

Slow. Quick. Quick. Quick. Comfy sneakers and a pair of leather loafers tapped across the closet floor. One. Two. Three. Four. The two women moved as one. Then Patsy locked eyes with Delia and took a step between Delia’s legs. Without breaking their gaze, she carefully reached down to grasp Delia’s knee and bring it up to her waist.

“Oh, Pats…” Delia breathed out. She didn’t think she could feel so sexy at her ripe old age. But she did, suddenly.

“Tilt your head back,” Patsy whispered.

“Patsy,” Delia hesitated. There was no way slender old Patsy could hold her weight. Even if Patsy looked like she still went to the gym and kept fit.

“I’ve got you,” Patsy promised.

Delia put her trust in the woman’s hands and leaned back, her back arching before Patsy quickly recovered her body from the dip and the music came to a halt.

Their faces were inches apart, heavy breaths mixing as their bodies recovered from the thrill of the dance. The closet went silent. Delia leaned in to give her woman a passionate kiss.

000

At eight-thirty, Lucy anticipated her mother’s phone call. By nine, she decided to call and leave a voice message. By ten, she called, texted, and sent a Facebook message. By eleven, she decided to drive over. By midnight, she stormed into the building.

“No one is answering,” the security guard informed.

“Then let me up there.”

“I can’t do that.”

“My mother isn’t prepared to be out this late, she doesn’t have her medication!”

“Okay, I’ll call again-”

“Call be damned! She has seizures. I have her medicine. She could be seizing as we speak and I’ll arrest you for negligence,” she threatened, and her London Police Department jacket made it believable.

“Alright, but I’m coming with you.”

Six floors later, the elevators dinged and Lucy came running out with the security guard.

“Doctor Mount?” he called out.

“Mum?” Lucy searched the massive living room, then the kitchen, then knocked on the double doors that she assumed were the master bedroom. “Mum, are you in there? Mum?” Lucy opened the door and gasped when her eyes registered what they saw.

On the big bed was Patsy Mount and Delia Wallace, close and cozy, headphones in their ears. They were watching some sort of video on Patsy’s tablet. Both women were fully clothed.

“Lucy!” Delia ripped out her headphones and glanced at her watch.

“What on earth are you doing, mum?”

“It’s called a YouTube, Lucy, and it can teach you how to cha-cha,” Delia answered. After their kiss in the closet, they decided to sit on the bed and talk. They talk for a long time, again, this time about a more serious topic of conversation. Eventually, their conversations took on a lighter tone and Delia admitted she wanted to learn how to cha-cha. That was how they ended up watching instructional videos on Patsy’s tablet, a jack splitter allowing both women to listen from two sets of fancy noise-cancelling earbuds Patsy owned.

“What’s going on?” Patsy removed her earbuds and gave the security guard a questioning look. She then glanced at the woman Delia had called Lucy and saw that she didn’t look much like Delia. Not at all. Lucy was a tall, blonde, fifty-year old cop with a stern face. Her features weren’t as soft as Delia’s, but she certainly had her bright blue eyes.

“I apologize, Doctor Mount, she threatened to arrest me.”

“My mother was supposed to be home three hours ago-”

“I’m not a child, Lucy, don’t scold me like that. You sound like your grandmother-”

“Mum!”

“Don’t mum me, I’m _your_ mother.” Now Delia caught herself sounding like her own mother.

“She has seizures if she doesn’t take her medication,” Lucy told Patsy.

“I’m in good hands,” Delia reminded, “Doctor Mount has lots of experience taking care of head injuries.”

Patsy began to laugh at Delia’s comment. And then at the frantic state Lucy was in. And then at the worried expression on the security guard’s face. She laughed without inhibition.

“This isn’t funny,” Lucy snapped.

“I’m sorry,” Patsy shook her head. Delia was now laughing too.

Lucy crossed her arms and looked firmly at her mother. This caused the two women to laugh even harder.

“Mum,” Lucy groaned.

“Oh, Pats, enough already.” Delia was now laughing because Patsy was laughing. “I’m gonna pee my pants!”

Patsy shrieked.

“You are being very childish, Doctor Mount,” Lucy scolded and took her mother’s hand.

“Hey, don’t talk to her that way!” Delia swatted the hand away.

“I can say whatever I want, I’m the only one around here who seems to care about your health!”

“That’s not true,” Patsy settled a bit.

“Oh, what do you know,” Lucy spat.

“Hey!” Delia growled at her daughter, “I raised you better than that!”

Lucy rolled her eyes, but she simmered when she realized her anger came from being laughed at and no longer from her mother’s irresponsibility.

“Fine... I’m sorry, Doctor Mount.”

“Better,” Delia gave her daughter a firm look.

“Can we go now?” Lucy asked.

“Just wait a minute,” Delia huffed. She was having such a good time with Patsy she lost track of time. She didn’t want to leave so abruptly.

“You can go, good sir,” Patsy told the security guard and he didn’t have to be told twice. He dash from the yelling and scolding between the women, with pleasure.

“Here, at least take this,” Lucy opened the pill bottle and gave her mother one capsule. “I’ll get you some water.”

“It’s fine,” Delia helped herself to Patsy’s glass of water on the side table. It caught Lucy by surprise, seeing her mother take a sip from the other woman’s glass. “Have a seat,” Delia told her daughter.

“I’m fine,” Lucy insisted on standing. It was only then that she looked around and saw how luxurious the flat was.

“Very well,” Delia agreed. “I have to tell you something.”

“Christ, what now, mum?” Lucy huffed.

Delia smiled at Patsy, and then at her daughter.

“Patsy and I have decided to get married.”

Lucy felt all of her blood pool in her boots. Her head went fuzzy and, suddenly, everything went white. Her mother. Her straight, Christian, married-to-her-father-for-fifty-years mother was going to marry a woman she had known for five minutes. A loud thump came afterwards as Lucy’s limp body collided with the carpet.


	2. Chapter 2

Lucy was out cold for half a minute. She slowly came to, hoping it was all just a dream, but she opened her eyes and saw her mother and the notable redhead looking down at her.

“Oh lord,” she placed her hand on her forehead.

“Are you alright?” Delia asked, “Does your head hurt?”

“No…” Lucy sat up, “to both.”

Delia sighed and glanced at her fiancée. “Patsy, do you mind giving Lucy and I a moment? We need to have a talk.”

“Of course,” Patsy stood to her full height and began to walk towards the door. “I’ll put the kettle on…” she mentioned on her way out.

Delia offered Lucy her hand, but Lucy—as stubborn as her father—ignored it and stood up on her own. “I called you...” she snapped, “many times.”

Delia went into her purse and, sure enough, her brand new senior-friendly flip-phone had multiple notifications. All from Lucy.

“I’m sorry, cariad, you know I’m not used to having a cellphone. I didn’t even think to check it since I got here-”

“All I could picture was you on the floor, again, having a seizure and soiling yourself—when you were really just doing the nasty with Professor Mount!”

“Lucy,” Delia gasped, offended, “I would never… and on a second date!”

“But becoming engaged is okay?” Lucy countered.

Touché, Delia thought. “That’s a different story,” she admitted softly.

Lucy huffed and glanced outside the balcony window. “So let’s talk…” she opened the sliding door and stood outside to get some much needed fresh air. She helped her mother step out with her, and they took a seat on one of the marble benches.

They sat in silence, for a minute, and Delia reached over to place a soft hand on her daughter’s lap.

“You know… back then, fifty years ago, same-sex relations were _illegal_.”

“I’m aware of the history of the law.”

“So you can understand that many people, men and women who were _queer_ hid themselves—or chose not to live their truth.”

“Right.”

“I chose not to live my truth,” Delia breathed out.

Lucy looked at her mother with curious eyes.

“I’m a lesbian,” Delia said, for the first time in her life. It felt strange and scary to say, and she had never had a reason to say it out loud before. But now that she did she felt relieved.

“I don’t understand,” Lucy winced with confusion.

“What don’t you understand, cariad?” Delia looked at her daughter curiously.

“You were so in love with Papa.”

“Of course,” Delia gave her daughter a small smile, “I loved him as a friend and as the father of my children. But… even he knew I wasn’t living my whole truth.”

“So you like women? Exclusively?”

Delia nodded her head.

“You were only— _with dad_ —to have children?”

“Well…” Delia blushed, “obviously there were other times, when we were both _in the mood_.”

Lucy shut her eyes and furrowed her brows, now regretting that she had asked.

“Oh...” Delia scoffed at the face Lucy made, “we were stuck with each other for forty-eight years, Lucy, we had to find ways to pass the time.”

“Okay,” Lucy shuddered. “So let me get this straight…” she rolled her eyes when she remembered her mother was anything but straight, “You were—are—a lesbian, but your existence was punishable by incarceration, so you agreed to marry my father in a marriage of convenience?”

“I guess you could put it that way...”

“Suddenly, I feel like my whole childhood was a lie,” Lucy admitted.

“That’s a bit dramatic,” Delia teased lightly.

“I wrote a six-page essay in my writer’s craft class about how you and dad were what real love looked like,” Lucy narrowed her eyes. “You were the couple everyone looked up to, you worked so well together!”

“Maybe the reason why we worked so well... is because we had to put extra work into our facade.”

“I don’t know what’s upsetting me more: that your marriage was a sham, or that you were miserable for fifty years.”

“I wasn’t miserable,” Delia promised, “I wanted children, and a spouse, and I got all that.”

“But you forced yourself to be with someone you didn’t love.”

“No,” Delia shook her head, “I agreed to marry someone who loved me… because I couldn’t marry the person _I_ loved.”

“So this Patsy is a woman from your past and, now that dad is out of the picture, you can run back and marry her?”

“Lucy…” Delia sighed, “Patsy and I were together _years_ before I met your father.”

“ _Years_?”

Delia took a deep breath and gazed into her daughter’s eyes. Lucy looked so much like John.

“Patsy and I met in nursing school. We loved each other in secret, which was fine, at first, when we both lived in the nurse’s home. But then Patsy decided to move out and become a midwife, and it became too hard to be together. We barely had time to see each other, and the planets had to align for us to have a moment alone. It was too hard, for me. So… I broke-up with Patsy one night, I told her I couldn’t stand the time apart, and I told her it would be easier if we just accepted that we could never be together. Then I left her at the coffee shop we were at. I didn’t mean to run off to a café a couple blocks away, but I needed to cool off. That’s where I met your dad, you see. That’s when he saw that I was upset and he offered to buy me a slice of cake.”

“You didn’t tell that part of the story,” Lucy dropped her jaw in awe. “When we were kids, you told us how you met dad at the café, that’s what I wrote in my essay. You never mentioned you were upset when he offered to buy you the slice of cake.”

“Well, I was...” Delia huffed, “because I had just done the hardest thing in my life: I had just walked away from Patsy.”

000

Patsy Mount leaned against the kitchen counter and crossed her arms as she waited for the kettle to boil. When the red switch flipped to blue, she poured the hot water into two mugs. She placed them, as well as a plate of biscuits, onto a tray and delivered the tray to the balcony, where Delia and Lucy were still talking.

“Ta,” Lucy said politely.

“Thank you, sweetheart,” Delia thanked with a smile.

Patsy returned the smile and was about to go back inside, to give the mother and child some privacy, but Delia took hold of her arm.

“Would you sit with us, Pats?”

“O-okay,” Patsy hesitantly sat down beside her fiancée.

“I like your place,” Lucy commented. “It’s really nice.”

“Thank you,” Patsy gave the woman a shy smile.

“I didn’t mean to be snappy,” Lucy continued, “I was just worried about mother.”

“I understand,” Patsy nodded.

“I just told Lucy everything,” Delia mentioned.

“That’s good,” Patsy awkwardly looked at her fiancée.

“I’m not homophobic…” Lucy defended herself, “if you think that’s why I fainted in shock. I just didn’t know my own mum was _like_ _that_.”

“Of course not,” Patsy half-heartedly agreed. Lucy’s tone rubbed her the wrong way. She _was_ a woman _like_ _that_ and had been for over fifty years, and proud of it. It took her a very long time to accept who she was, she would be damned if anyone made her feel less than for it.

“I would have had the same reaction, if it had been another dark secret mother kept from me my whole life.”

“It’s true,” Delia playfully nodded her head, “She fainted when I told her Santa Claus isn’t real.”

“He isn’t?” Patsy tried to be funny.

Lucy rolled her eyes and laughed, though mostly internally.

“Your mother has told me so much about you,” Patsy smiled. “I hoped to have had a much different first meeting.”

“We could have, if mother checked her phone,” Lucy agreed.

“I’m still getting used to having it,” Delia defended.

“Well…” Patsy offered her hand, “nice to formally meet you, Lucy.”

“Likewise, Doctor Mount.”

“Please, just Patsy.”

“Patsy,” Lucy corrected.

Delia smiled as her fiancée and daughter formally became acquainted.

“I look forward to getting to know you before you become our _stepmother_ ,” Lucy said with a slightly bitter taste in her mouth, to which Delia shot her some very familiar cut-eye. Lucy was obviously trying to reach out but was still hesitant to spontaneously accept Patsy as her mother’s new spouse-to-be. She really didn’t know Patsy yet, and she feared this spur-of-the-moment engagement might lead to outcomes that could hurt her already widowed mother.

“Oh,” Patsy scrunched her nose in disgust, “I hope nobody calls me _stepmother_.”

“But that’s what you’ll be...” Lucy reminded, “ _legally_.”

“I know that, but nobody needs to call me _stepmother_.”

“Everyone calls mum, mum. We have to call you something and we can't call you mum too.”

“Everyone can call me Patsy,” Patsy insisted.

“We have lunch together every Saturday,” Delia interrupted the bitter back and forth between her daughter and fiancée, “why don’t you come join us, Pats? Then you can meet my family and everyone can get to know each other better.”

000

On Saturday afternoon, Patsy drove over to meet Delia’s family. It was the first time she had stepped on Poplar ground since she left, over fifty years ago. So much had change, she barely recognized the old sooty neighbourhood it once was. Asphalt covered what was once a layer of cobblestone, and though the street names remained the same, Poplar had succumbed to the remodelling of modern architecture.

Patsy parked her car on an empty curb and assessed her appearance in her mirror before stepping out of the car. She wanted to make an extra good first impression to the rest of Delia’s family, especially since her first encounter with Lucy was less than ideal.

She rang the doorbell and smiled when her fiancée answered the door.

“Good afternoon, Pats!”

“Hi, these are for you…” she handed Delia a bouquet of green flowers.

“Thank you,” Delia smiled and took Patsy by the elbow. She gave her a peck on the lips and then walked her into the living room where everyone was already waiting.

Patsy felt the hairs on her skin rise. She held university lectures in front of hundreds of students for a living, but the six pairs of eyes that watched her now made her feel conscious.

“Everyone…” Delia grinned with pride, “this is Patsy, my fiancée.”

The news was no surprise to Delia’s family. She had already told them earlier that her new fiancée was joining them for lunch that Saturday. Gasps filled the room, moments before Patsy arrived, and Delia had to explain herself all over again, much like she did to Lucy the night before. Yes, she was a lesbian. Yes, her husband knew. No, she did not resent her husband. Yes, she loved her husband in a unique way. No, she did not regret marrying a man. She answered all the questions they had. Although, the rest of her family appeared to be quicker to accept the idea of her becoming engaged than Lucy was. No one else had a fainting spell.

“Hello,” Patsy muttered shyly.

“Patsy, this is my granddaughter Rosie, her husband Jim, their baby and my great granddaughter, Poppy; my son Tim and his girlfriend, Beth, and of course you know my Lucy.”

“I’ll try to remember everyone’s names by the end of today,” Patsy promised.

“Nice to meet you,” Jim eagerly stood up and shook Patsy’s hand, a cold beer in his other hand. He was a scruffy man with kind eyes and some flavour of an American accent. “Are you hungry?” he asked, “I hope you’re hungry, I already have the grill going.”

Delia’s family was very organized. It appeared that everyone had a job and they did it without being told. Patsy naturally followed Delia’s lead and helped her make the roasted potatoes and veggies in the kitchen. Lucy and Tim were in charge of desserts, Jim and Rosie grilled the barbecue outside, and Beth took care of little Poppy, who loved Beth’s company. Poppy was pushing Beth’s cheeks in different directions and molding them into funny faces. Poppy was laughing hysterically and Beth was a more than willing participant.

“You’re a natural,” Patsy smiled at Beth.

“You think so?” Beth asked, her cheeks squished from the sides and her mouth about half the width it normally was.

“Yes,” Patsy answered, “It takes a special kind to be great with kids.”

“I guess so,” Beth agreed. She tried to smile but Poppy had stretched her cheeks downwards into a frown.

“I’ve already asked if they’re giving me grand babies, so don’t bother asking,” Delia told Patsy, in a joking tone.

“We’re just waiting for the right time,” Beth reassured.

“If you wait for the right time to have kids, you’re never going to have kids,” Lucy replied. She and Rosie’s father did not have the best relationship, and she raised Rosie on her own, but she had no regrets. Motherhood had brought her great joy and tested her true strength.

“Tim just turned forty-two and I’m not thirty-five quite yet, we still have time,” Beth defended.

“Mother’s bias, but you and Tim would make beautiful babies,” Delia said with pride.

“Ma,” Tim whined.

“They’d be beautiful caramel babies!” Delia exclaimed.

Tim shook his head and lowered it into his hands to cover his face in embarrassment.

Beth laughed. “I’m sure your bloodline will appreciate some of my Jamaican melanin,” she teased, directed at Tim. She loved him and his Welsh complexion.

The Wallaces and Patsy laughed in agreement.

“Do you have children, Patsy?” Tim asked, curiously.

“No...” Patsy shook her head, “never got around to it.”

“Well, she’ll have three step-children, one step-grandchild, and a great step-grandchild soon,” Lucy mentioned.

“Oh, that’s right,” Tim smiled. Patsy immediately saw that Tim had Delia’s smile. He looked a lot more like his mother than Lucy did. Tim had dark hair, a stocky build, and a soft face.

“But _please_ don’t call me stepmother,” Patsy insisted.

“She doesn’t like the title,” Lucy exposed.

“Patsy’s just fine,” Patsy agreed.

“Alright, _Patsy_ ,” Delia smirked. “Everyone has a job in preparing lunch and I need you to make the salad while I bring the corn out to Rosie and Jim.”

“Yes ma’am,” Patsy gave her fiancée a salute and started cutting greens.

Delia took the freshly peeled ears of corn outside into her garden where Jim and Rosie were laughing, flirting, and keeping an eye on the barbecue.

“These are ready to go on,” Delia announced.

“Let me get those for you, _cariad_...” Jim quickly took the aluminum tray from his grandmother-in-law’s arms. Rosie couldn’t help but smirk every time he tried to say Welsh words in his American accent.

“Thanks, cariad,” Delia smirked as well. He tried his best and she appreciated him for it.

“Did you leave Patsy inside on her own?” Jim asked.

“She’s a big girl, Tim—I mean, Jim—I don’t need to babysit her.”

“Mum’s probably interrogating her as we speak,” Rosie admitted, peering into the kitchen window to see if there was any confrontation.

“I know what your mum is like,” Delia told her granddaughter. “She’s just being overprotective, as always, that’s why she’s the copper in the family.”

“She’s right,” Rosie smirked and looked at her husband. “Uncle Tim told me that mum used to fight off the kids who bullied him, then turn around and scold him for being at the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“I remember being interrogated,” Jim recalled the days when he first started dating Rosie.

“She’s a tough cookie but we love her,” Delia reassured.

“Tim seems to like Patsy…” Jim said, nodding towards the window.

Rosie and Delia looked in and saw Tim helping Patsy chop vegetables. Both of them laughing at something.

“He’s always been the friendly one,” Delia said with a small smile. The site warmed her heart.

“I take it Lucy hasn’t been as friendly…” Jim thought out loud.

“She’s _trying_. She just doesn’t know her yet and she probably thinks I’m making a big mistake in marrying her so soon. But I’m sure they’ll be friends once they get to know each other.”

“Do _you_ know her?” Rosie asked.

“Of course,” Delia replied.

“But you haven’t seen her in fifty years, mamgu, people change…”

“Well, we’ll have the rest of our lives to learn everything about each other.”

“That’s bold,” Rosie commented.

“Marrying your grandfather after three months of courtship was bold.”

Rosie gave her grandmother a sad pout. She couldn’t imagine living against one’s true nature, and it saddened her that her own grandmother had to hide herself from the world and her own family for such a long time.

“I don’t regret it, of course, otherwise I wouldn’t have you…” Delia smiled and pulled Rosie down by the ears to give her a kiss on the forehead.

Rosie smiled.

“But God has given me a second chance, cariad, and I don’t have very many years left. I want to spend the rest of those years with the person I’ve already lost a lifetime with.”

“Oh, mamgu…” Rosie wrapped her arms around her grandmother and gave her a firm hug, “I’m glad you got this second chance. I didn’t understand it at first, but I get it now.”

“Thank you, cariad,” Delia smiled and hugged her granddaughter back.

“You’re not gonna have another baby with Patsy, are you?” Rosie teased.

“I’ve done my time _three_ times,” Delia laughed. “But maybe Patsy will carry this time,” she teased back.

Rosie and Jim laughed.

000

In the kitchen, Patsy continued to laugh with Tim. He had asked what she had done for a living, and when he found out she is still an active nursing research professor, he told her stories about the nicknames students called the professors behind their backs. Not only was the pathology professor called ‘Sir Sloth’ because of how slow he spoke, the pharmacology professor was called ‘Sir Sildenafil’ after the erectile dysfunction medication, because his exams were incredibly hard. Patsy found humour in this.

“Have you heard any of _your_ nicknames?” Tim wondered.

“No, I don’t think so,” Patsy shook her head. “Although, I did have a student anonymously write in my end-of-term review: ‘Prof’s hair was too red and distracting’.”

“Brutal,” Tim laughed.

“I took it as a complement,” Patsy laughed along.

“What did I miss in here?” Delia asked as she walked into the house and heard all the laughter.

“Just talking to Patsy about nursing school,” Tim informed with a smirk.

“Your son was quite the class clown, did you know that?” Patsy asked.

“I don’t know where he gets it from,” Delia replied. “John and I were well behaved in school.”

“He must have been switched at birth,” Beth teased.

“Impossible!” Tim exclaimed. “Look…” he walked up to his mother, crouched down to her height, and smiled. “Smile with me, mum…” he encouraged.

Delia forced a smile and the two of them were practically twins. Same smile, same eyes, same cheeks.

“Dropped at birth, then,” Beth corrected.

The kitchen erupted with laughter, Lucy included.

000

When lunch was ready, they sat around the table in Delia’s garden. When all were seated, Patsy reached for one of the spears of asparagus that was inches from her own plate and took a bite.

“Would you like to lead us in prayer this time, mum?” Lucy asked, looking directly at Patsy.

Patsy widened her eyes and paused mid-chew to put the spear down on her plate.

“Sure,” Delia closed her eyes and bowed her head and thanked The Good Lord for the bounty for which they were about to receive.

“Amen,” the table chimed in.

“Amen,” Patsy muttered, still embarrassed that she was caught snacking before prayer. She only ever said her prayers before meals when she lived at Nonnatus House, but that was decades ago. She certainly did not recall saying prayers when she and Delia dated either.

“Lovely prayer, mum,” Lucy praised as they began to eat. “I don’t know if you know this, Patsy, but our mum was the head volunteer at our church for nearly forty years.”

“I didn’t know that, but I know she’s always had the heart for volunteering,” Patsy gave her fiancée a proud smile. “Remember the Saint John’s Ambulance brigade?”

“Oh yes,” Delia recalled.

“Well, she was also a committed church goer,” Lucy added.

“Oh,” Delia scoffed, “That was all your father, cariad. I was in it for helping the needy, but if it were up to me, we would have gone to church twice a year like everyone else—at Christmas and Easter. Lots of better things I could have done on a Sunday than sit still.”

Lucy went quiet.

“So what do you like to do for fun, Patsy?” Jim asked, wanting to change the subject. He could feel the tension between his mother-in-law and his future grandmother-in-law and he wanted to keep the peace. He also wanted to know more about the new face at the table.

“Hmm...” Patsy paused in thought. “Well, I’ve got a dog named Coco and she keeps me busy most days of the week. Other than work, I’m part of a Senior Ladies Golf League at my country club. We call ourselves ‘The Golf-en Girls’.”

“Like The Golden Girls?” Tim asked.

“Exactly,” Patsy smiled at the young man.

“Are you any good?” Jim asked.

“Mediocre at best,” Patsy chuckled. “But the luncheon afterwards is what I look forward to the most, you know, it just gives us old things a chance to chat. What about you folks? What do the Wallace’s do for fun?” She glanced around the table, wanting to get to know Delia’s family too.

“Eat,” Jim answered with a deep chuckle.

“He’s not wrong,” Tim laughed along.

“Well, you two look like you do a lot more than eat…” Patsy indicated at her bicep, suggesting Tim and Jim had big arms.

“Tim goes to the gym when he’s bored,” Jim answered for his brother-in-law, “And I work in construction so I lift lumber for a living.”

“And you ladies?” Patsy asked.

“Gosh, I don’t even remember what I did for fun before I had Poppy…” Rosie gave the eleven-month-old child on her lap a tickle, causing Poppy to squeal.

“We used to join those yoga classes at the park,” Lucy mentioned, looking at Rosie and Beth.

“Oh yes,” Rosie recalled.

Patsy forced a small smile and tapped her nails against her thigh under the table. She was starting to feel anxious. She wanted to get to know Delia’s family better, but they seemed to have very little to share about themselves.

“What do you think of the barbecue?” Jim asked Patsy when he saw the smile fade from her face.

“It’s delicious,” Patsy exclaimed, ever so thankful for Jim’s ability to keep a conversation going. “The ribs fall right off the bone, my compliments to the grillmasters!” she added.

“I make the barbecue sauce myself,” Jim informed with a proud smile.

“It’s fantastic,” Patsy smiled.

“Do you remember when grandpa first tried your sauce?” Rosie asked. “We had only been dating a few months, and Pops said _he_ would marry you if I didn’t.”

The table erupted in laughter.

“Are you sure you want to marry into all this?” Jim asked Patsy in a joking tone. “They’re a crazy bunch.”

“ _You_ haven’t fled yet...” Patsy countered with a smirk.

“You’re right,” Jim laughed and wrapped an arm around his wife, who was now feeding a quiet and content Poppy. “I wouldn’t trade it for the world.”

“Good, because it’s your turn to change Poppy…” Rosie handed the child over to her husband.

“Wouldn’t trade it in for the world,” Jim reminded himself as he carried Poppy back into the house to change her nappy. The sour face Jim made made Rosie and Lucy laugh.

“Speaking of marriage, has anyone told Uncle Peter?” Rosie asked.

“No, I still have to call him.” Delia glanced at her watch and calculated the time in Vancouver, which was eight hours behind. “He’d still be sleeping right now. I’ll call tomorrow morning and try to catch him before he goes to bed.”

“Good idea,” Rosie agreed.

“Have you been married before, Patsy?” Tim wondered.

“No,” Patsy shook her head and gave Delia a smile. “I’ve only wanted to marry one person, and one person only.”

“Aww,” Beth said with a pout.

“I think that’s a hint, son…” Delia nudged Tim with her elbow and nodded towards Beth.

“Ma,” Tim blushed.

“Don’t worry, Missus Wallace,” Beth chuckled. “It’s the twenty-first century, _I_ will propose to him if he hasn’t asked and the time is right.”

“You might be waiting a long time for the right time,” Lucy stated.

“I think it’s good that they’re not rushing into things,” Patsy admitted.

“You got engaged to my mother after two dates,” Lucy reminded.

“That’s a different story,” Patsy countered.

“I know, but it’s still a little quick, don’t you think?” Lucy challenged, ignoring the scowl her mother gave her.

“I think we’ve waited long enough,” Patsy replied.

“Do you remember when I first met dear Papa?” Beth changed the topic before her boyfriend’s sister and her boyfriend’s mother’s fiancée could clash some more.

Tim nearly spat his beer and burst into laughter.

“What happened?” Patsy wondered, smirking at the state Tim was in.

“Well…” Beth began to laugh, “I had been invited over to Saturday lunch, just like this, but it was December so we were all inside. I had arrived a tad early with Tim and I had gone to the lav, but the old lock on the door was one I had never seen before. So I thought I had locked the door before I went... but apparently I hadn’t.”

“Oh no…” Patsy widened her eyes.

“That was the first time I met your father,” Beth glanced at Tim. “Sitting on the loo with my knickers at my ankles.”

“The poor man could not be any more apologetic,” Delia recalled with a light laugh.

“He couldn’t look me in the eye for a whole year after that,” Beth added.

“Oh dad…” Tim lifted his beer towards the heavens.

“To Mister Wallace,” Beth lifted her wine glass.

They lifted their drinks, Patsy included, and toasted to John Wallace.

“To what are we toasting to?” Jim asked as he returned, Poppy bouncing on his hip with a clean nappy.

“To grandpa,” Rosie answered.

“Ah, to the only man who wanted to marry me,” Jim toasted.

They took a sip of their drinks and simmered into comfortable silence.

“Was that your red Lexus IS 250C I could see from the bathroom window?” Jim asked Patsy.

“Yes… do you know the model?”

“He watches car reviews on YouTube like it’s a TV series,” Rosie exposed with a chuckle.

“I know what YouTube is!” Delia wanted everyone to know. Patsy had showed her cha-cha tutorials on her tablet, moments before Lucy walked in on them last night.

“That’s right,” Patsy pat her fiancée’s hand.

“I love cars,” Jim confessed, though it was no surprise to anyone at the table. “You should see it, Rosie, it’s a beautiful convertible! What’s the acceleration on that baby?”

“It’s not too fast,” Patsy promised, “It does zero to one hundred in nine seconds, but the IS-F model I had before could do it in four-point-eight seconds. ”

“Oh baby,” Jim hummed.

“Do you want a room with Patsy’s car?” Rosie teased.

“No, but I’d love to see what’s under the hood…” Jim smirked.

“I’ll show you later,” Patsy smiled.

“I’d love that,” Jim nodded with glee. “So… is it dessert time?”

“I hope so,” Delia admitted. She loved talking about Patsy’s car, but she also loved dessert.

“What are we having?” Rosie asked.

“Trifle,” Tim announced.

Rosie smiled. “My favourite!”

“Tim and Lucy make the best trifle,” Beth told Patsy as her boyfriend and his sister brought the dessert out into the garden and began serving them. “Actually, they make the best desserts, period.”

“Do you cook, Patsy?” Jim asked.

“Just a little,” Patsy blushed.

“She makes really good pasta...” Delia spoke from experience, “real restaurant quality.”

“That’s neat,” Beth smiled. “I wish I could cook.”

“Everyone has their talents,” Delia reassured. “Besides, you’re an excellent singer.”

“You sing?” Patsy asked with a smile.

“A little,” Beth blushed.

“She does more than sing a little!” Delia said with pride, “Do you know the owner of the Almeida Theatre? What am I saying, I don’t even know him. Anyways, our Beth here sang at his daughter’s wedding.”

“That was a once-in-a-lifetime gig,” Beth said softly.

“She also sang at my seventieth birthday and she’s very _very_ good,” Delia added. “Oh, would you sing for us, Beth? For me?” she asked politely.

“Well, I can’t say no to you, mum...” Beth stood up and smiled. “This is for Patsy and Delia… congratulations on your engagement!” She raised her glass and they toasted to the happy couple. She then cleared her throat and began to sing Delia’s favourite song from her repertoire: _My Girl_ by the Temptations.

Patsy and Delia smiled at each other and held hands under the table as Beth sang acapella. She had a beautiful voice and Patsy felt goosebumps rise from her skin as she belted out notes with ease. It added to the magic of being with Delia’s family and slowly feeling welcomed into the clan.

000

After dessert, Patsy took Jim out to take a look at her car. She popped open the hood and showed him the engine he so desperately wanted to see.

“Three and a half litre V6. What is that like, three hundred horsepower?”

“Spot on,” Patsy smirked. Jim looked like a kid at the candy store.

“How fast have you gone with it?”

“I drive the speed limit,” Patsy answered.

“What? No…” Jim looked at her with sad eyes.

“I’m a responsible driver...” Patsy laughed, “and you should be too.”

“But…” Jim practically cried, “what if you could drive on a clear stretch in the country and you knew there weren’t any cops around?”

“Then maybe,” Patsy smirked.

“You have to tell me if you do…”

“I don’t speed and tell,” Patsy teased.

Jim smirked and inspected the shiny engine.

“You know…” he said in a different tone, “when Rosie and I started dating, Lucy was up my ass about every little thing I did. I felt like I couldn’t get a break.”

“I know her type,” Patsy reassured. “She doesn’t let people into her life very easily.”

“Right, but she’s a real sweetheart when she finally does,” Jim promised. “She’s grandma’s favourite, even if she swears she loves all three of her children equally. Don’t tell her I said that though.”

“Your secret is safe with me,” Patsy smiled. “Thanks for the warning… and for saving the awkward silences back there.”

“Hey, no need to thank me. I remember what it’s like to be the new face at the table, especially with my warm and welcoming mother-in-law,” he said with a laugh. “Just don’t let her get to you,” Jim encouraged.

“I can handle her,” Patsy promised. “She just needs a little more patience.”

Delia stepped out of her front door and immediately saw Patsy working under the hood of her car. She didn’t understand the appeal of advertisements with girls posing with cars until that very moment. Patsy, in her white button-up blouse, lavender houndstooth trousers, and black loafers, made the car look exceptionally good.

“Hi, _cariad_ , take a look at this engine!” Jim exclaimed.

Delia broke out of her stare and placed a hand on her hip.

“Later, Jim. You two better get back in here and help with clean-up. Don’t you think for a second that I don’t see you two trying to avoid clean-up!”

000

As the sun began to set, Delia’s family members began to trickle home. Not that home was very far from Delia’s house. Lucy lived in a flat across the street, Rosie and Jim had a house three streets over, and Tim lived by the hospital, which was only a twenty-five minute walk away on a clear day. Only Beth lived a while away, and she left first to get some rest before the early shift she had the next morning. Tim, on the other hand, stayed the latest.

“Would you like me to make your bed for you?” Delia asked, full of love, but also wondering if her son was going to stay the night or if she and Patsy were going to have the house to themselves.

“No, mum, I won’t stay much longer.”

“Alright,” Delia glanced at Patsy, somewhat apologetically.

Tim took a seat on the couch and opened another can of beer.

“Would you like a ride home?” Patsy offered, having had only a couple of glasses of wine a few hours ago.

“Nah,” Tim took a sip and then winced, “Beth drives me over but I always walk home.”

“Are you sure?” Patsy asked.

“Yes, don’t worry, it’s part of my exercise regime.”

“Alright,” Patsy agreed. “How long have you and Beth been together?” she asked after a moment.

“Four years,” Tim said softly. “That’s actually what I wanted to talk to you about, mum...” he said, looking at his mother.

“You know I love her the most out of all the girls you’ve brought home,” Delia said with a smirk. “If you’re asking for my blessing, you’ve had it years ago.”

“Mum…” Tim winced.

“What?” Delia worried something bad had happened. “Were you unfaithful? Was _she_?”

“Nothing like that,” Tim reassured and chugged the rest of his beer before blurting out, “I think I’m gay.”

Patsy and Delia looked at each other in surprise.

“Really?” Delia asked gently.

“I’ve been thinking about it a lot, these past few weeks. Now that Beth and I have been together for four wonderful years, there’s more pressure to marry—and I would—she’s my bestest friend and the loveliest companion. But... I can’t marry her if I doubt that I’m even that type of man.”

“Is there a particular man?” Delia wondered.

“Well… for starters, there’s my best mate, Mike.”

“Oh, cariad,” Delia sighed. “You two have been friends since you were young lads.”

“I’ve had so many girlfriends but none of them have made my heart flutter the same way Mike does,” Tim admitted. “I’m gay, mum. Like you.”

“Christ...” Delia whispered softly and bit her tongue. She wasn’t sure if she should feel happy for her son’s self-discovery, or heartbroken for how Beth would react. She really did love Beth.

“We’ve been together for four years and we haven’t moved in together. I knew there must have been a reason other than us working so far apart. It just all makes sense!” Tim exclaimed. But his excitement faded when he realized he had to tell Beth. “Oh crap… this is going to break Beth’s heart. Mum, she’s going to kill me. I’ve wasted four years of her life.”

“Darling…” Delia sighed with sympathy, “better to tell her now than fifty years into your marriage.”

“Right,” Tim sighed.

“But congratulations on coming out,” Patsy didn’t know what else to say that would comfort the distressed lad.

“Thanks,” Tim huffed and then laughed. “Can I call you tomorrow, mum?”

“Of course,” Delia went into the fridge and handed her son a container of leftovers. “Now go home and get some rest. You’ll have a lot of sorting out to do tomorrow.”

“Right. Thanks, mum, you’re the best!” Tim gave his mother a kiss on the cheek and let himself out the door.

With all of Delia’s kin gone, Patsy and Delia sat on the couch together in silence. The old mantel clock chimed in the new hour.

“You have a lovely family,” Patsy said softly.

“They sure keep me busy,” Delia laughed to herself. “Gosh, do you think Tim and Beth will stay friends? I really do love Beth.”

“Maybe… but she may need some time to digest,” Patsy said honestly.

“Right,” Delia sighed. “But, I mean, good for him for figuring it out after forty-two years of life.”

“Delia…” Patsy said softly, “were your kids pretty sheltered from people of our kind?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean… Lucy didn’t sound pleased to learn you were gay, and Tim dated many women, even though he had feelings for men.”

“What are you saying, Pats?”

“I’m saying… they seem like they grew up thinking being straight is the default.”

Delia narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms. “We raised them to love people with good hearts,” she explained. “John and I never hinted that we would love them any less if they turned out like me.”

“Right…” Patsy took a shaky breath, not wanting to start a fight but voicing her perspective, “but you never actually said that being gay was okay.”

Delia huffed and glanced at the mantel where pictures of her family occupied the whole length of the ledge. “No, I didn’t. I’m a bad mother,” she replied.

“You’re not a bad mother,” Patsy reassured.

“Well, not only did I lie to them about having a perfect marriage, I failed to let them know it’s okay to be gay.”

“Maybe you were so focused on appearing straight that you sheltered your family from our kind.”

“I had to shelter them from a lot of things, Patsy,” Delia snapped.

“I’m not picking a fight,” Patsy promised.

Delia sighed and rested her head against the back of the couch. She looked at Patsy and said, “I tried really hard to be a good mother to my kids and a good wife to my husband. I hid my truth for so long… maybe I hoped that none of my kids would turn out like me because I didn’t want them to go through what _I_ did.”

“Oh, Delia…” Patsy gave her fiancée a sad look and gently cupped her cheek with a soft hand.

“Even now that I’ve come out to my family, I feel like I’ve let them down. Even if I’ve raised them not to hate people for being different, I just…” Delia shook her head, “I’m an old gay grandma who’s still really scared of being gay.”

“It _is_ scary...” Patsy spoke from experience, “but every day you get a little less scared and every day you get a little more proud.”

Delia smiled and placed a kiss on the palm of Patsy’s hand. “Would you stay the night?” she asked softly.

“Are you mad at me?”

“Only a little, but some pillow talk might change that.”

“I don’t have any pyjamas,” Patsy countered with a smirk.

“You can borrow one of my night gowns...”

“Well… I can’t say no to that.” Patsy chuckled and followed her fiancée upstairs and into her bedroom.

Delia went into her dresser and gave Patsy one of her nightgowns to change into. Patsy unbuttoned her blouse and revealed her aged body.

“Jesus Christ…” Delia eyed her fiancée. Patsy’s skin was marked with wrinkles, but Delia could see the very visible bulges that made up Patsy’s abs.

“What?” Patsy asked.

“I can wash my sheets on these…” Delia took a step closer and placed the palm of her hand on her fiancée’s stomach.

“Oh,” Patsy blushed.

“How often do you have to go to the gym to stay this fit?”

“Three times a week… but my trainer and I do it to maintain my bone health, more than anything. I’ve got a high risk of developing osteoporosis.”

“Well, this is…” Delia was mesmerized at how fit Patsy had gotten since she last saw her, “wow.”

“Stop it, you’re making me blush,” Patsy whined.

“I had no idea how perfect you are with your nice flat, fast car, and godly body…”

“I’m nowhere near perfect,” Patsy reassured.

“Oh yeah?” Delia glanced up at her lover.

“I push on pull doors, and stub my toes on coffee tables, just like everyone else.”

“Those are real flaws,” Delia said sarcastically.

“I’m also, recently, impulsive and very anxious.”

“Say no more or I’ll have to call off the wedding!” Delia teased.

Patsy smiled and continued to get dressed for the night. They got cleaned-up in Delia’s bathroom, and soon they both wore one of Delia’s nightgowns. Patsy’s stopped short at her knees, while Delia’s reached her shins.

“Which side of the bed do you sleep on?” Patsy asked.

“This one…” Delia lifted the covers and slipped in.

“Would it be strange if I slept on your late husband’s side?” Patsy winced.

“No one has slept on that side for two years, Pats, but you’re welcome to sleep on the couch...” Delia teased.

“The bed’s fine,” Patsy hopped into the bed and spooned her lover.

Delia sighed into her lover’s arms and melted into the warmth of Patsy’s chest on her back. Patsy spooned her for the first time in fifty years and they both marvelled at how familiarly good it felt to have their bodies fit together.

“You’re so soft,” Delia said with a smile.

“Thanks,” Patsy smirked.

“I’ve missed being spooned by a woman,” Delia sighed. There was just a gentleness to being held by a woman that her hard-bodied husband just couldn’t get right.

“I’ve missed spooning _you_ ,” Patsy replied.

“That too,” Delia smiled, briefly, until she remembered she hadn’t been with a woman in fifty years but Patsy had. “How many women have you had after me?” she asked softly.

“I’m not sure…” Patsy admitted.

“What’s your best guess?”

Patsy paused. “Thirty?”

“Thirty?” Delia sat up and turned around to look at her fiancée.

“Give or take a few,” Patsy admitted. “It’s been a long fifty years, although things didn’t really pick-up for me until the mid-seventies, thanks to the rallies at Hyde Park in ‘72. That really put everyone in the mood.”

“Christ,” Delia huffed. “You were there? I read about those rallies in the newspapers. Weren’t you scared of losing your job?”

“Yes… but it was so liberating, Delia. I didn’t plan to go, at first, but a co-worker dragged me into it and it changed me so much. I actually learned to love myself...”

“And _thirty_ other women,” Delia said bitterly.

“You can’t get mad,” Patsy scolded, “ _You_ dumped me!”

“I’m not mad,” Delia promised. “Baffled, but not mad.”

“Oh,” Patsy furrowed her brows.

“I haven’t been with a woman since we were together…” Delia settled back down and laid on her pillow to come eye-to-eye with her fiancée.

“How did you bear it?” Patsy wondered aloud.

“I’m not sure...” Delia shook her head, “though John was very accommodating. We shared a locked box of magazines. I’m sure he knew I used them when he worked nights.”

“That’s so sad…” Patsy frowned.

“I know,” Delia sighed. “But we really were happy, Pats. Especially when we had Lucy… we were so happy, exhausted but happy. We gave each other children and we loved each other for that.”

Patsy gave her fiancée a sad smile. “I always wondered how your marriage turned out,” she admitted. “I was really sad and a little angry that you married someone else… but above all, I really wished you weren’t miserable.”

“I wasn’t,” Delia agreed. “I got really lucky with John. Like I said, we had a unique marriage. He kept me happy and I made him feel appreciated.”

“In the bedroom?”

“There’s a lot more to a marriage than sex, Pats.”

“I know that…”

“But yes, including the bedroom. I taught him how to tip the velvet and I would give him a gobby when he deserved one.”

Patsy made a sour face.

“Sorry…” Delia laughed, “too much information.”

“I’m an old lady, I can handle it.”

Delia smirked at her fiancée.

“You know, Deels…” Patsy tucked a lock of Delia’s hair behind her shoulder, “a few weeks ago I was just an old professor who spent my nights marking assignments. I never thought for a second that I would find someone to keep me company, let alone the woman who stole my heart fifty years ago.”

“I certainly thought you would never share a bed with me again,” Delia said softly.

“Well, I’m glad I got invited back.”

“Patsy…” Delia smirked, “you know as well as I do that I never invited you into my bed. You crept in and helped yourself.”

“Oh…” Patsy furrowed her brows. Now that she thought about it, she did invite herself into Delia’s room on multiple occasions, long ago in the nurse’s home.

“Lucky for you, seeing you come in was always the highlight of my day.” Delia smiled and leaned in to give Patsy a soft kiss. Patsy kissed her back, and she stiffened when Patsy’s hand grasped her bottom.

Patsy noticed and paused.

“Pats…” Delia sighed, “I haven’t… in a long time.”

“That shouldn’t be a problem,” Patsy reassured.

“No, Pats, I’m… I don’t look the same as I used to.”

“Neither do I,” Patsy reassured.

“Right, you started going to the gym and got fit. I became a mother of three, my body went from being an incubator to being a vending machine... _three_ times.”

Patsy couldn’t help but smile. “I think you’re just as beautiful,” she admitted softly.

Delia shook her head, a hard no.

“I do,” Patsy promised.

“I’m not ready to show you.”

“Are you going to make me wait until marriage?” Patsy asked in a teasing tone.

“Would that be a problem?” Delia asked seriously.

“No,” Patsy quickly shook her head in denial. “No, I’ll wait as long as you need me to.”

Delia smiled, gave her fiancée a kiss, then turned around to let Patsy spoon her again.

“When’s the last time you… _you know_.”

Patsy paused and thought again. “Three or four months, I think.”

“Oh…” this time Delia spoke without surprise. She figured Patsy was a lot more active than she was, in more ways than one.

“What about you?” Patsy asked.

“Three years…” Delia recalled.

Patsy went quiet. She briefly forgot that John was ill before he passed away. She regretted asking.

“I’ve probably forgotten how to...” Delia joked.

“You never really forget,” Patsy reassured. “It’s like riding a bike.”

“There will be no riding of any sort,” Delia lectured with a light laugh. “I’ve heard of old ladies breaking all sorts of bones and dislocating hips from riding. Those days are long gone.”

“Note taken,” Patsy chuckled.

Delia smirked.

“Remember when we used to do this on a single bed?” Patsy asked, tightening her hold around her fiancée.

“How can I forget?”

“We didn’t need very much space…”

“We still don’t,” Delia scooched her big old behind and pressed it flush against Patsy’s front.

“At least I don’t have to do my walk of shame at the crack of dawn,” Patsy teased.

“That’s right,” Delia laughed. “You were walking walks of shame across this city, even before they were called walks of shame.”

Patsy smirked and blushed at the same time. “Can I make you breakfast in the morning?”

“Now _that’s_ something you’ve never done, the morning after.”

“No, but I’ve always wanted to,” Patsy admitted with a small smile. “I’ve always wanted to stay the night and not rush out unnoticed. I wanted to sit down and have a meal with you, at least, but it would have raised too many questions and eyebrows at the nurse’s home.”

“We should have rented a flat together.”

“That would have been a wonderful idea.”

Patsy and Delia talked and reminisced until they grew tired and fell asleep in each other’s arms for the first time in fifty years.

000

The next morning, at breakfast, Patsy showed Delia how to change her relationship status on Facebook. Within seconds, all of their friends knew of their engagement.

Trixie Dockrill was first to comment: _It took you two long enough!_

Barbara Hereward commented second: _I second Trixie! I’m glad I lived long enough to see this!_

Within an hour, all of their other friends from nursing school and The London—friends who had their suspicions confirmed, or learned of their relationship for the first time—had liked and commented on the status. All who reached out seemed happy for them, and if any of Delia’s church ladies were displeased, none voiced their objection. Even if they did, Delia was so happy, so high on life, she could not give a damn about acquaintances that were not important to her.

Patsy returned to Bristol by Sunday afternoon, after having breakfast with Delia. She let herself into her house, kicked the door shut, and lowered herself onto her knees to greet the little Pomeranian that came prancing her way.

“Hello, Coco! Hello!” Patsy laughed as the dog excitedly greeted her, a little tongue attacking her face.

“Welcome back, Miss Mount.”

“It’s good to be back, Dot,” Patsy stood up and smiled at her housemaid and companion.

“How was London?”

“It was alright,” Patsy shrugged. “I taught a lecture, made dinner, got engaged, the usual...”

“Engaged?” Dot’s eyebrows shot up in surprise.

“Yes,” Patsy smirked and took a seat on the living room couch. She felt as light as a feather, not even her parking ticket, for parking on Delia’s street overnight without a permit, could pull her down.

“Congratulations,” Dot smiled.

“Thank you,” Patsy laid back against the cushions and stretched her body.

“Who’s the lucky gal?”

“Delia,” Patsy smiled and sang, “Ooh, Delia.”

“The lady from Facebook you met up with last Sunday?”

“Yesss,” Patsy hissed excessively.

The young woman smirked and held back her laughter. She had never seen her employer so happy and looney.

000

After breakfast with Patsy, Delia spent the rest of her Sunday morning in her back garden. She deadheaded her flowers, and removed the weeds that were beginning to creep into her flower beds, until Lucy checked up on her, as she always did.

“Morning, mum…” Lucy let herself in through the gate, knowing her mother would already be in the yard.

“Morning, sweetheart,” Delia stood up and removed her gardening gloves.

“Did you take your morning meds?” Lucy asked.

“Yes,” Delia rolled her eyes. She didn’t need to be asked like a child.

“Good. So... I noticed Patsy’s car was still here earlier this morning…” Lucy awkwardly glanced around the garden, “I’m assuming she stayed the night?”

“She did,” Delia said, proudly. It had been a long time since she had done something so scandalous. She felt alive.

“You changed your relationship status on Facebook… a lot of people seem to have seen it coming,” Lucy added. She wished she could have said the same, still feeling blindsided by her mother’s recent reveal.

“I told you, Patsy and I were together long before I met your father.”

“Are you going to start spending the night in Bristol too?”

“Maybe,” Delia smirked.

“How’s that going to work out when you get married? You’re not going to sell the house and leave all of us, are you?”

“Lucy…” Delia huffed and placed a hand on her hip, “can you police us a little less?”

“I’m not policing,” Lucy objected. “I’m just asking the questions nobody else is asking-”

“Be less of a detective, then,” Delia corrected.

Lucy huffed. “We can’t all just eat cake and dance under a rainbow, mum. Marriage is a serious commitment and you can’t just marry someone you haven’t seen in fifty years, especially not someone who lives most of her life in Bristol. You can’t run off and leave all of us here-”

“Why not?” Delia challenged, “Why do I need your permission? You never asked me if you could run off and have a baby out of wedlock...”

Lucy was stunned.

“I’m sorry, I took that too far,” Delia said softly.

“Yeah, a bit,” Lucy said bitterly.

“Look…” Delia sighed, “I love you… you’re my girl and you always will be. I appreciate that you took good care of me after my accident, but I’m still an adult with some dignity. Patsy makes me happy, can’t that be enough for you too?”

“We already lost you once,” Lucy shook her head at the awful thought. “Do you know how hard it was for _all of us_ after your accident? You couldn’t remember who we were, and you were seizing every few days, it was scary. We thought we would never get you back.”

“But I came back...” Delia countered, “and I’m not dead yet so I don’t want to live my life like I’m already six feet under.”

“Alright…” Lucy lifted in hands in surrender. She somewhat agreed with her mother, though she still had the instinct to protect her from herself.

“If it makes you feel any better, I don’t plan, nor do I want, to move to Bristol,” Delia admitted softly. “My life is here with my family... in Poplar.”


	3. Chapter 3

~ London, July 2, 1972 ~

Fried eggs sizzled on the stove top as Delia hustled about the tiny yet spotless kitchen. Eleven year old Lucy, seven year old Peter, and three year old Tim were already seated at the round kitchen table in their freshly laundered clothes. Delia Wallace never skipped a beat. Lunches were packed and breakfast was just about ready, and her three children were clean and presentable.

“Delia!” John yelled as he ran down the stairs of their small home. “Have you seen my-” he paused when he saw his work gloves in his wife’s hand.

“Washed them last night,” Delia waved the gloves and tossed them at her husband.

“What would I do without you?” John sighed in relief.

“Go to work with dirty gloves...” Delia answered.

“You’re a doll...” John gave his wife a thankful smile and sat down as she placed a plate of eggs in front of him.

“No!” Tim shook his head and pushed the plate away as soon as his mother lowered it onto the table.

“What’s wrong now, Tim?” Delia asked, placing a hand on her hip and looking at her son.

“No eggs!” Tim shook his head again.

“Use your words, sweetheart...” Delia encouraged.

“Eggs are baby chickens, mum!”

Delia sighed and glanced at her husband for some support. It appeared that it was Tim’s turn to have a fit that morning. She cleared her throat when John continued to read his morning paper.

“What?” John glanced up from his newspaper and saw the look on his wife’s face. “Oh… Timothy, listen to your mother.”

“I don’t want to eat eggs, Papa!” Tim huffed.

“Stop being a baby,” Lucy scolded her youngest brother.

“I’m not a baby,” Tim defended.

“Then eat your eggs...” Peter chimed in, “baby.”

Delia sighed. “Nobody’s a baby, now eat your breakfast or you’ll be late for day camp today.”

“But the book said eggs are baby chickens,” Tim argued.

“And sausages are made of baby pigs,” Lucy countered.

“Yeah, and toast is made of baby bears,” Peter added.

“Stop it!” Tim groaned and covered his ears.

“All of you, stop it!” Delia scolded, feeling a headache coming on. “Tim, would you like cheesy potatoes instead?”

“Why does Tim always get to eat what he wants?” Peter countered.

“Yeah, Tim always gets what he wants,” Lucy agreed.

“That’s not true,” Delia defended.

“Then I don’t want to eat my eggs either!” Peter shook his head, “I want cheesy potatoes.”

“Me too,” Lucy said.

Delia closed her eyes, briefly, to say a little prayer. She understood now why some species ate their young.

“Cheesy potatoes,” Peter demanded.

“John,” Delia huffed and looked to her husband for some support.

John looked at his wife and widened his eyes when he saw the clock behind her. “Goodness!” he quickly stood up, “I’ve got to go, love!”

“John, the kids are in the middle of a protest!” Delia whined.

“So are the queers...” John pointed at the newspaper on the table and gave his wife a kiss on the lips before grabbing his lunch bag and dashing out of the door.

Delia looked at the newspaper while all three of her children demanded cheesy potatoes. On the front page was a picture of a group of women holding up signs, the caption stating ‘HOMOSEXUALS ARE REVOLTING’. The first few lines stated that seven-hundred people had gathered at Hyde Park yesterday morning to march for LGBT liberation.

“Cheesy potatoes! Cheesy potatoes!”

Her children’s growing chants broke Delia from her trance. She couldn’t believe there were women, women like her, fighting for a legal right to exist. She couldn’t imagine a life outside of the closet.

“Cheesy potatoes!” Lucy yelled.

“Enough!” Delia finally had enough of the yelling. “We’ll have cheesy potatoes tomorrow. If you don’t want what’s in front of you, then you’re free to leave and eat whatever scraps you find on your way to the community centre!”

The children suddenly went quiet. Lucy and Peter began to eat their eggs, and Tim settled for a piece of buttered toast.

After breakfast, the three children walked to day camp at the community centre with all the other children on summer vacation. Delia quickly cleaned-up the kitchen and sat down to read the rest of the newspaper on the table. Still in her apron, she read on about the gay protests that happened at Hyde Park the day before.

~ London, July 1, 1972 ~

In the back seat of a ‘70 Morris Minor, Patsy could not believe she had agreed to make the two hour journey from Bristol to Hyde Park. She, of all people, was about to join the protest for gay rights in the middle of London. She was terrified. And what she feared, most of all, was that somebody would recognize her.

“Are you alright back there, Pat-a-cake?” the driver asked.

Patsy didn’t answer.

“If you need me to pull over, blink twice. I don’t want your breakfast projecting onto the inside of my new car.”

Patsy didn’t blink.

“Talk to us, Patsy…” the woman in the passenger seat encouraged.

“Aren’t you two scared someone will recognize us?” Patsy finally blurted out.

“Us?” the woman driving the car chuckled, “Ellen and I will look like every other woman there! It’s  _ you _ that will draw attention with your bright red hair.”

“Joan!” Ellen scolded her girlfriend.

Patsy sank in the back of her seat and insecurely crossed her arms.

“Here…” Ellen offered a silk scarf to her fellow co-worker.

Patsy quickly wrapped the scarf around her head and put her sunglasses on. She thought she looked like the women in the magazines, or what Trixie would look like riding a convertible. Patsy suddenly missed Trixie.

“It’s going to be okay, Patsy,” Ellen reassured. “There’s going to be hundreds of people there, we’ll be but a speck in the crowd.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Patsy somewhat agreed.

“Just avoid the cameras,” Joan added.

“Oh, I will,” Patsy promised with a huff. The last thing she wanted was to be on the cover of a newspaper and lose her job for being at the protest.

“Look…” Joan said in a softer tone, “I know we’re taking a big risk in going to this, but this is important… for us… for people like us… now and in the future. We could be making history! Imagine if we changed the way things are? Imagine a world where we can fully live our lives, just like the heterosexuals!”

Patsy couldn’t imagine.

“And who knows…” Ellen chimed in, “you might  _ finally _ meet another woman. It’s about time you moved on from that Delia girl you’re still hung-up on.”

Patsy still couldn’t imagine.

~ Bristol, 2010 ~

Patsy held Delia’s hand in public as they walked towards the golf and country club from the car park. Patsy was excited for Delia to meet her friends, and truth be told, she couldn’t wait to teach Delia how to golf. It seemed silly, but she looked forward to wrapping her arms around the Welsh woman and teaching her how to swing. Delia, on the other hand, was afraid she was going to make a fool of herself, having never picked up a golf club in her life. But she was looking forward to spending more time with Patsy. After almost a week apart, Patsy in Bristol teaching at the college, and Delia spending the week with her family, the two were glad to be talking to each other in person instead of on the phone.

“Are those tennis courts?” Delia asked as the nets caught her eye in the distance.

“They sure are. Do you play?” Patsy wondered.

“I haven’t in a long time,” Delia admitted.

“Do you want to play a game after lunch?” Patsy offered.

“Sure,” Delia smiled but quickly withdrew her hand from Patsy’s hold when she saw a couple of men walking towards them.

Patsy gave the two men a friendly smile as they walked past them, and then turned towards Delia when they were out of earshot. “Are you alright?” she asked softly.

“I don’t know why I did that,” Delia admitted with a worried wince.

“Old habit, maybe?” Patsy wondered.

“Maybe,” Delia blushed. “I’m sorry…” she extended her arm and reconnected their hands.

“Are you embarrassed to be seen with an old woman like me?” Patsy teased lightly.

“No! Christ, no,” Delia promised. “I just… panicked. I’m sorry.”

“I get it...” Patsy reassured, “no need to apologize, Deels.”

“I’m so embarrassed that I did that,” Delia winced again.

“Don’t be. I know it takes some getting used to... after being prohibited from being yourself in public for so long.” Patsy gave her fiancée a reassuring smile.

“I guess...” Delia sighed and kept walking towards the country club, avoiding Patsy’s eyes. She didn’t mean to make things awkward, but her panic ripped her hand away from Patsy like a reflex.

“Are you ready to get into your golfing shoes?” Patsy asked in a lighter tone.

“Sure…” Delia huffed and then smirked, “but I still don’t think I’ll be any good… I’d be more than happy to watch.”

“Don’t be silly, I’m going to teach you!” Patsy promised, “It’s all for fun and the points don’t really matter. Plus, I’d like you to meet my friends. I’ve met your family, I think you should at least meet mine before we tie the knot.”

000

“Look who finally showed up…” one of the older ladies yelled out as Patsy and her date approached.

“We’re right on time...” Patsy defended.

“But you’re the last one here, so you have to keep score,” the lady replied.

“Fine,” Patsy agreed and took the clipboard from one of the women.

“Aren’t you going to introduce us to your friend?” another woman asked.

“I was getting there, Stella...” Patsy gave Stella a playfully stern look. “Gals, this is Delia, my fiancée.” 

“Really?” another woman asked, “I thought that was a Facebook prank.”

“It certainly was not,” Patsy said proudly. “Delia was actually my first love… and we’ve found our way back together after fifty years apart.”

“Well shit…” the woman cursed.

Delia didn’t know if it was a good curse or a bad curse, but she suddenly felt put on the spot. Patsy’s friends were visibly more non-traditional than hers. In fact, all of them seemed to be wearing men’s clothing. It made Delia feel intimidated, yet happy to see women so comfortable in their own skin.

“Well then, welcome to the family!” a woman approached Delia and opened her arms for a hug. She had short gray hair under a brown newsboy cap that matched her suspenders. “I’m Grace, nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too,” Delia reciprocated the embrace and felt relief in the friendly contact.

Patsy placed her hand on the small of Delia’s back and gave her a warm smile. “Delia… these are The Golf-en Girls.”

“Hello,” Delia replied meekly.

“Nice to meet you, Delia…” a woman approached her with opened arms, “I’m Ellen.”

“Nice to meet you,” Delia smiled as the women began to give her warm hugs.

“And this is Ellen’s wife, Joan…” Patsy introduced.

“How do you do?,” Joan took her turn to give Delia a welcoming embrace.

“And Stella…” Patsy called on her friend, “Our goldstar.”

“Because I get the most hole-in-ones, and I’m a goldstar lesbian,” Stella smirked and approached her friend’s new fiancée.

“Goldstar lesbian?” Delia returned Stella’s hug and then gave Patsy a questioning look.

“It’s a new term the kids use these days,” Patsy laughed. “It’s a lesbian who’s never been with a man.”

“Oh…” Delia furrowed her brows. She had never heard of such a title, and she felt a little uneasy, having been married to a man for forty-eight years.

“It’s silly, if you ask me,” Patsy added honestly, giving her fiancée a reassuring look.

“Have you set a date?” Grace asked.

“Not yet,” Patsy admitted.

“Can we play some golf now?” Joan asked, swinging her arms back and forth. “I’m all warmed up and ready to let some steam off...”

“Lead the way,” Patsy nodded towards the space between the tee markers.

Joan teed off first, followed by Ellen, then Stella and Grace. Patsy kept track of their points.

Since Patsy and Delia were last to arrive, they were the last to go. When it was their turn, Patsy picked her driver and placed her tee in the ground. She set herself up, did a couple of practice swings, then let it whip the ball up and over some trees.

“That was good, Pats!” Delia praised, “You’re so close to the hole!”

“Could be better,” Patsy winced and then laughed. “Your turn…”

Delia copied Patsy’s previous motions and set-up her tee, much the same. She picked a similar club from her borrowed set and then stood awkwardly beside it.

“Here…” Patsy stepped up behind her fiancée and wrapped her arms around her, guiding Delia’s hands to the best place on the club. “Feet a little further apart…” Patsy instructed.

Delia did as she was told and parted her feet.

“Now swing back like this…” Patsy guided Delia’s club back, and then stopped. “Then let it swing, you got it?”

“I think so,” Delia nodded.

Patsy stepped away and and gave her fiancée a nod of approval.

Delia gripped onto her golf club and drew it back, like Patsy had shown her, then let it swing with some force.

The golf ball didn’t go very far, but it arched perfectly, catching some air, before rolling a little closer to the green.

“That wasn’t too bad!” Delia turned towards her fiancée and raised her arms in celebration of her first tee-off.

“No, that wasn’t bad at all!” Patsy wrapped her arms around Delia’s waist and and gave her lover a peck on the lips.

“It’s like we’re interrupting their honeymoon...” Stella rolled her eyes and then smirked.

“Let them be, Stella…” Grace scolded, “Just because your wife doesn’t hold you anymore-”

“She’s recovering from a shoulder replacement!” Stella barked back with furrowed brows.

“Exactly,” Grace laughed, “she can’t hold you until her shoulder heals.”

000

When all of the women had putted their balls into the first hole, they gathered their clubs and began walking towards the next hole.

“So why did you two split-up fifty years ago?”

“Stella!” Ellen scolded her friend.

“What?” Stella whined, “Don’t you want to know?”

“Yes, but that’s not the first question you ask,” Ellen lectured.

“I’m eighty years old, Ellen...” Stella countered, “I don’t have time for gossip foreplay.”

“There’s always time for foreplay,” Joan chuckled to herself.

“You’ll have to excuse Stella,” Ellen told Delia as they walked together. “She’s a bit blunt.”

“I don’t mind,” Delia reassured with a small smile. “And to answer your question, Stella,  _ I _ broke up with Patsy, fifty years ago.”

“Because she’s married to her career?” Stella wondered.

“Not quite,” Delia admitted.

“Times were different, as you know,” Patsy reminded. “We wanted different things and so we went our separate ways.”

“Something like that,” Delia agreed.

“I kind of remember this story,” Joan replied. “Yes, you’re  _ the _ Delia, the one Patsy was running from when she moved out here.”

“Guilty as charged,” Delia chuckled nervously.

“You married a man,” Joan recalled. “How was that?” she asked with a sympathetic wince.

“Not as horrible as people keep thinking,” Delia answered with a hint of annoyance. Even Patsy questioned her happiness, and satisfaction in bed, as if marrying a man was the worst thing imaginable. Maybe it was, for some women like them, but she was very lucky with John Wallace. They made each other happy, and they gave each other children, and she wanted every gay woman to stop assuming she was miserable.

“I mean, good to hear it worked out for you,” Stella praised.

“Three children, three grandchildren, and one great-grandchild later, and I couldn’t be happier,” Delia reassured.

“They’re all lovely,” Patsy agreed. “I’ve met all but her son in Canada, and they’re all precious.”

“You’ve had time to meet them, Pats?” Joan teased. “Did you meet her family before or after you gave her a key to your house?”

Patsy rolled her eyes and chuckled, “We’re a couple of old ladies. Like Stella said, we’re too old for engagement foreplay.”

“There’s always time for foreplay!” Joan countered again.

The women laughed. Then they began teeing off at the second hole.

“So, Delia…” Grace approached as she waited for her turn to tee off, “what are some of your favourite songs?”

“Favourite songs…” Delia paused in thought, almost surprised to have been question. More surprised than when Stella asked why she and Patsy split up fifty years ago.

“Yes, what kind of music are you into? What do you picture yourself walking down the aisle to, or having your first dance to?” Grace pushed on.

“Oh, Grace,” Patsy chuckled. “You’ll be a guest at our wedding, not a musician.”

“It would be an honour to play at your wedding, Pats!” Grace smiled at Delia, “What do you think, Delia?”

“I agree with Patsy, Grace, I wouldn’t want you working at our wedding.”

“It wouldn’t be work,” Grace promised. “You retire from work, not your passion. Now what would you like to walk down the aisle to?”

Delia gave the kind woman a soft smile. “I think you should ask Patsy. I’ve already had my turn to be bridezilla, it’s her turn to have what she wants.”

“You? Bridezilla? Really?” Patsy replied.

“I was insufferable,” Delia confessed with a shy smile. “I couldn’t decide between vanilla or carrot cake, or roses or buttercups… I’m lucky John was such a patient man.”

“Christ, I can’t imagine…” Patsy admitted.

“Well…” Delia sighed, “I used to think you only got married once, so it had to be perfect.”

All of them chuckled quietly.

“Your turn, Pat-a-cake…” Joan stated as she finished her turn.

Patsy teed off and then helped Delia do the same.

“Are all of you married?” Delia wondered.

“Only Stella, Joan and Ellen are,” Grace answered.

“Married in our hearts for forty-five years, civil partnership since 2004,” Joan added with a hint of bitterness that it had been six years since the law allowed civil partnerships but it had yet to let them marry fully.

“But I’m not married,” Grace continued. “Never was, never will. Patsy and I were supposed to be the two to die unwed, but she seems to have changed her mind.”

“Sorry, Grace,” Patsy laughed. “But can you blame me?” she asked, nodding towards Delia’s body.

“Stop that...” Delia chuckled and swatted her fiancée’s arm, “behave.”

“Like I said, I thought it was a Facebook joke,” Stella said. “Patsy was never the type to settle down.”

“So I’ve heard…” Delia playfully sassed, giving her fiancée some cut-eye. She knew of the thirty women in Patsy’s past.

“Hey, we all have…  _ history, _ ” Patsy blushed.

“This is true,” Joan laughed.

“Some more than others,” Ellen rolled her eyes at her wife, who also had a long list of women before her.

“Damn right,” Stella said proudly, and then laughed.

“Stella prides herself in the golfing trophies on her shelf, and the notches on her wall,” Grace told Delia with a smirk.

“I thought she was married,” Delia whispered back.

“Happily so,” Stella reassured, “but the wife and I have had other women over for dinner, if you know what I mean.”

“Is that how she hurt her shoulder?” Delia teased.

Stella’s jaw dropped in surprise, not expecting Delia’s jab. “She’s funny, Pats…” she laughed, “I like her.”

Patsy gave Delia a smile and held her hand as they began to walk towards their golf balls.

“So what do you do for a living?” Grace asked Delia.

“I was a nurse...” Delia answered, “but I retired ages ago.”

“That sounds relaxing,” Grace smiled.

“Aren’t you retired?” Delia wondered.

“Me?” Grace chuckled, “Oh no, we all still work.”

“Really?” Delia raised her eyebrows in surprise.

“Not full-time, of course...” Grace reassured, “only our Pats still works full-time.”

“What do you all do?” Delia asked, glancing around at the women in her company.

“Oh, I’m a pianist, so I still teach,” Grace answered. “Ellen and Joan were midwives, initially, like Patsy, but they’re in the medical equipment business now-”

“We didn’t have much of a choice,” Joan interrupted bitterly. “Ellen and I lived together for  _ years _ . In our late forties, unwed and avoiding the local men, it was only a matter of time until one of the neighbours began to pry into our windows and catch us stealing a kiss on the couch.”

“Were you two arrested?” Delia wondered.

“No…” Joan said with a scoff, “he reported us to the College of Midwives and we were immediately released from our positions.”

“That’s horrible…” Delia sympathized.

“But we’ve been very blessed,” Ellen reassured. “We never liked the idea of working office jobs, but it sure helped having women like us in the office.”

“I’m glad that worked out for you two,” Delia said with some relief, and a hint of anger that it happened in the first place.. “What about you, Stella?” she wondered.

“Me? I’ve got my own pub,” Stella answered as she sat on her haunches and calculated how far she had to hit her golf ball to land on the green. 

“A real dyke bar, back in the day,” Joan added.

“A great place to find a honey to take home for the night,” Grace said with a chuckle.

“Oh...” Delia understood with a small shy smile.

Stella swung her club and watched her golf ball land on the fairway. “I inherited it from my dad...” she explained, “bless his soul. When he ran it, it was a popular spot for businessmen. When he got sick, Agnes and I took over and, naturally, it became a hot spot for women like us. We still run it, except, not lately since Agnes hurt her shoulder carrying crates of lager.”

“I’ve never been to a pub for women like us,” Delia admitted.

“Never?” Stella gasped.

Delia shook her head in denial.

“Well, I know where we’re taking you for your bachelorette party…” Joan chuckled.

“Oh no,” Delia laughed, “Patsy can have a bachelorette party, but I’m much too old for that!”

“Oh, Delia...” Stella walked up to the Welsh woman and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. “We need to show you what you’ve been missing.”

“That’s right!” Joan chimed in, “You need to dance with a drag queen and maybe even get a dance from a young lady.”

Patsy locked eyes with her fiancee and they both laughed at the ridiculousness her friends were playfully proposing.

“Don’t knock it ‘till you try it,” Stella told Delia.

“Alright, you two…” Patsy butt in. Stella and Joan had enough fun eliciting reactions from her fiancée.

“Alright, well, we’ll think of something,” Stella promised.

000

As the game progressed, Delia felt more and more comfortable around Patsy’s friends. Stella and Joan, in particular, had such strong personalities, which was a little intimidating at first, but she had warmed up to it. She also learned a tad more about Patsy’s past and about the alternate side of the last fifty years. It turned out that the women in her company were all involved in the revolution at Hyde Park that she had only read about in the papers. She learned of the secret code words, and hotspots, and the whole underground society of women loved women and continued to love women despite the world telling them not to.

It made her feel a little guilty. As if she chose the easy route and saved herself all the trouble by marrying a man. 

“You played pretty well today, Delia...” Stella praised as they sat around a round table for lunch.

“Thank you,” Delia smiled. “I have to admit I was a little nervous about playing with all of you today, but you’ve made me feel like a real golfer… even if I was stuck in that greenside bunker for twenty minutes.”

“Well, Delia, you are very lovely and I’m glad you and Patsy have found your way back together,” Ellen agreed. “I still remember the mess Patsy was in when she first moved out here.”

“We don’t have to talk about that,” Patsy quickly jumped in.

“She was a wreck,” Joan ignored Patsy and told Delia.

“Again, we don’t have to talk about that now,” Patsy laughed nervously, “Lunch is about to be served.”

“How much of a wreck?” Delia asked curiously.

“Well…” Joan snort, “first of all, she was the dark and mysterious new woman at work, so I was immediately intrigued.”

“Intrigued?” Ellen laughed, “Joan was obsessed! Joan had this theory that Patsy was a woman like us, and that she came here rom Poplar because she was running away from a man who wanted her hand in marriage.”

“Which turned out to be almost-true,” Joan reminded.

“Really?” Patsy was shocked, hearing Joan and Ellen say it for the first time. “What made you think that right away?”

“First of all, you left the Order of Saint Raymond to work for our little clinic with a smaller population and less pay... so I knew you didn’t come out here for a better job,” Joan revealed.

“But how did you know I was a lesbian?” Patsy asked.

“Lesbian intuition,” Joan said proudly.

“She saw a copy of  _ The Girls in 3-B _ by Valerie Taylor in your purse while you were in the loo,” Ellen exposed her wife’s secret.

“You went through my purse? Fifty years ago?” Patsy was shocked but not surprised. Joan had always been the little investigator.

“I wasn’t actually looking… I was going to slip in the three pounds you wouldn’t accept for the lunch you bought for me earlier that week.”

“Sounds like Patsy,” Delia chuckled at the interesting turn of events.

“Anyways, it was hard as hell to get her out of the closet,” Joan shared.

“I feared for my life and my career, as you can imagine,” Patsy defended.

“I had to reveal that Ellen and I were an item for her to warm up to the idea of becoming friends with us. Otherwise, she would stay at home on her days off, locked away from the world like a princess in a tower.”

“I wasn’t completely isolated…” Patsy admitted, “I had Winston.”

“Who’s Winston?” Delia asked.

“My beagle, at the time…”

“We were worried about you,” Ellen admitted. “So we started to be more affectionate around you, hoping you’d catch on… and trust us to let us in.”

“So me catching you kissing in the clinical room wasn’t an accident?”

“Not one bit,” Joan laughed, “Although, I was more than happy to neck with Ellen at work... for a cause.”

“Well then…” Patsy huffed and then laughed, “It turns out there are a lot of things that have slipped past me these last fifty years.” She looked at Delia and arched her eyebrow, causing Delia to blush.

“And now you have a second chance…” Grace said happily, catching the loving glares between Patsy and Delia.

“That’s right,” Patsy smiled, placing her hand on Delia’s lap under the table. “And boy am I ever so lucky.”

Delia quietly gasped, initially, when Patsy’s hand grasped her thigh, and she gave her a smile, much like she used to at the Nonnatus House dining table.

000

Later that evening, Patsy drove Delia back to her house in Bristol. It was Delia’s first overnight trip away from Lucy’s watchful eye, and her cellphone rang as soon as the clock struck six.

“It’s Lucy…” Delia announced as they stepped into the door.

“Answer it before she has an aneurysm,” Patsy teased.

Delia gave her fiancée an unimpressed look and then answered the phone with a gentle “Yes, cariad?”

Patsy shed her cardigan and sat on the couch as she watched her fiancée speak on the phone. She couldn’t hear what Lucy was saying but she assumed it was a reminder for Delia to take her medications.

“I’m taking them right now…” Delia promised, going into her purse to grab her pill case, and then walking towards the kitchen to grab a glass of water.

Patsy remained seated on the couch and sunk into the cushions, content, as she heard Delia talk about her exciting day in Bristol.

“Sorry about that,” Delia winced as she came back and joined her fiancée on the couch.

“Oh, don’t apologize,” Patsy reassured.

“She treats me like a child sometimes, I know,” Delia huffed.

“She’s just checking in on you.” Patsy gave her lover a small smile and added, “It’s actually quite nice that your family looks out for you. God knows how many friends I have whose children have abandoned them in nursing homes.”

“I suppose I’m pretty lucky,” Delia admitted.

Patsy wrapped her arm around Delia’s shoulders and they sat on the couch in silence for a moment.

“Does anyone check in on you?” Delia wondered.

“Not really…” Patsy breathed out, “but I suppose Dot or one of the gals would notice if I went missing.”

“And me…”

“Right, and you.” Patsy smiled and gave Delia a kiss on the forehead. “So don’t ever apologize for having a family.”

“You have a family now too,” Delia reassured. “What’s mine is yours… Missus Busby-Mount.”

“Busby-Mount?” Patsy smiled, “When did you decide that?”

“I don’t know, it sort of just came to me,” Delia smiled.

Patsy rested her head on Delia’s shoulder and lovingly held her in her arms for a moment.

“So what are our plans this evening-”

“Delia, would you join me in the shower?” Patsy interrupted her fiancée.

“Since when did you favour showers over baths?” Delia chuckled nervously.

“Since I got my rainfall shower head and it feels like I’m standing in the warm summer rain…”

“That sounds lovely.”

“So you’d join me?” Patsy asked hopefully.

“Maybe some other time.”

Patsy lowered her head and placed her hand on Delia’s thigh. “You know, I’m going to see you naked eventually… so we might as well get it over with,” Patsy gave her fiancée a cheeky smile.

Delia didn’t answer.

“I’m not going to bite...” Patsy promised, “unless you’re into that now.”

“That’s not funny,” Delia scolded.

“Alright,” Patsy stopped. 

Delia remained quiet.

“When did you get so conscious?” Patsy asked softly.

Delia shrugged.

“You weren’t always so shy,” Patsy recalled, smiling internally at the memory of having younger Delia in her bed, fifty years ago.

“I guess it started after I had Tim…” Delia confessed.

“What happened?”

“He was a big baby and I had to have an emergency cesarean…” Delia breathed out, “I had a bit of a rough recovery.”

“Oh…” Patsy was a midwife, and she understood where Delia’s story was going.

“It was around the time John was trying to find work so he was out of the house a lot so I was taking care of two children and a newborn baby. I must have pushed myself too hard because, well, one hard sneeze did the trick and my stitches dehisced… the scars didn’t heal very well after that.”

“Oh Delia…”

“It’s not pretty, Pats.”

“Did John never touch you again after that?” Patsy asked.

“Well, no…” Delia admitted.

“If he had no problem with it, why would you think I would?” Patsy countered.

“We only made love in the dark, Pats. I never showed him my scars.”

It saddened Patsy that Delia was so conscious about her old scars. 

“Delia, remember when you saw my scars for the first time?”

~ London, 1956 ~

Raindrops trickled down the windows of the nurse’s home as Patsy and Delia kept warm on Delia’s single bed.

“Pats…” Delia moaned against her lover’s mouth.

Patsy hummed in satisfaction and continued to kiss Delia’s lips.

“Patsy…” Delia voiced again.

Patsy realized Delia wanted her attention and she pulled away from the kiss and opened her eyes.

“Patsy, I want you...” Delia gave her girlfriend a soft smile and began unbuttoning the front of Patsy’s pyjamas.

“Delia!” Patsy gasped and quickly placed her hand on her chest to stop Delia’s fingers.

“Sorry,” Delia gulped. “I’m sorry, Patsy, I assumed…”

Patsy furrowed her brows and sighed. “It’s okay, you just startled me, I think.”

“Would you like me to keep going?”

“Maybe some other time...” Patsy sat up and buttoned-up the button Delia had undone, “I think it’s time I went back to my room.”

“No, Patsy...” Delia sat up and placed her hands on her lover’s shoulders to hold her in place, “I’m sorry I didn’t ask first, but please don’t go…”

Patsy sighed. 

“If you want to save yourself for marriage, I respect that,” Delia promised.

“I’m not saving myself for someone else, especially not some man,” Patsy reassured.

“Then let’s talk about it…” Delia encouraged, “Let’s talk about why you got so scared when I unbuttoned your shirt.”

Patsy remained silent and avoided her lover’s gaze.

“Alright…” Delia sighed, “you don’t have to tell me.”

“No… I want to, because you’re my lover and I trust you.”

“I’m the same,” Delia promised.

“It’s just hard to say it out loud,” Patsy admitted.

“Take your time,” Delia said lovingly.

“So… you know about the interim camp…” Patsy started.

“Yes…”

“Well, they weren’t very nice to us, the guards, and one night my mother and I were caught bringing a cup of soup and handful of soda crackers for my I’ll sister and, well, we were punished for taking food without permission.”

“Oh Pats…”

“I have scars everywhere, Delia.”

“I’m sorry that happened to you. I’m sorry I tried to expose you.”

Patsy sat up and began to unbutton her blouse.

“Patsy, you don’t have to…” Delia reassured.

“I want to…” Patsy promised, “because I love you and I trust you.”

~ Bristol, 2010 ~

“I think I remember...” Delia recalled.

“I just want you to know that I still love you and I trust you. So I’m going to shower with the door unlocked, and I’ll see you after.” 

Patsy smiled and gave her fiancée a kiss on the forehead before heading upstairs to shower in her master bathroom. She left Delia downstairs, respecting her wishes not to shower together, and she turned on the warm water before shedding her clothes and stepping under the rainfall spraying from the ceiling. She closes her eyes as the water washes over her face and she let the warmth soothe her body.

“Can I join you?” Delia asked from behind the glass wall that divided the shower from the rest of the bathroom.

Patsy smiled at her lover’s change of heart. “Do you want to?” she asked softly.

“I do...” Delia took a shaky breath, “because I love you and I trust you.”

Patsy gave her lover a kind smile and watched Delia, hesitantly yet bravely, remove her clothes.

As Delia explained, a visible keloid spanned the midline of her abdomen, but Patsy made a point to keep her eyes on Delia’s.

Delia opened the shower door and stepped closer to her fiancée. She placed a hand under the warm spray of water and then stepped in to soak her body. She felt Patsy wrap her arms around her and she sighed in relief at how safe she felt in Patsy’s presence.

000

After their shower, it was Delia’s turn to sleep in Patsy’s bed. They didn’t bother getting dressed and instead remained nude under the covers. After the eventful day that they had, they were glad to be laying down and resting her feet. It was relaxing, just the two of them unwinding on Patsy’s bed after a long day.

They watched more videos on YouTube, this time Patsy showed Delia old recordings of music they used to listen to. They even sang along to old tunes they used to play on the record in Trixie’s room, all those years ago.

“I love this YouTube,” Delia exclaimed.

“So I’ve noticed,” Patsy laughed.

Patsy showed Delia the world of the internet, and she even taught her how to play Fruit Ninja on her smartphone. Delia was slowly becoming as tech-savvy as her children, thanks to the brilliant professor.

“Your friends are all lovely, by the way...” Delia mentioned when she was done playing with Patsy’s phone.

“They sure keep things interesting,” Patsy smiled.

Delia shimmied closer and rested her head on Patsy’s pillow. “It’s so nice that you have friends like us…” she added.

“They can be a bit much to handle sometimes, but I appreciate having them around.”

“What do you mean?” Delia wondered.

“Oh, you know... relationship drama, or lack-of-a-relationship drama, and, of course, trying to scope out if any of the other women at the club are secretly…  _ of the faith _ .”

“Is that what women like us do on their spare time?” Delia asked.

“Well, that’s what  _ we _ do, on our spare time— but we’re hardly an adequate sample size.”

Delia gave her fiancée a sad smile and began to pick at the pillowcase below her head.

“What are you thinking of?” Patsy asked softly.

“I… I just feel like I’ve missed out… on being a lesbian,” Delia confessed.

“Delia…” Patsy smirked, initially, until she saw that her fiancée was genuinely upset.

“I don’t know any of the terms, or the celebrities, or the movies that your friends talked about during the game today. I felt a little… out of the loop.”

“Delia, you don’t have to be in the loop to identify as a lesbian.”

“But there’s a whole…  _ subculture _ out there for women like us and I haven’t got the slightest clue about it.”

“It’s not too late to dive into it, if that’s what you want…”

Delia simply smiled in agreement. “I want to see those movies…”

“We can arrange that.”

“And I want to go to a Pride Parade.”

“We can arrange that too, next summer.”

“Oh, and I want a carpet muncher,” Delia demanded.

Patsy furrowed her brows. “Delia, what do you think a carpet muncher is?”

“A vacuum that’s manufactured by lesbians...”

“Delia…” Patsy tried to hold back her laughter.

Delia furrowed her brows and then blushed. “What? What is it?”

Patsy bit her bottom lip and shook her head in denial. She was trying very hard to contain her laughter, but she could not contain it any further.

“What’s so funny?” Delia chuckled when her fiancée began to howl with laughter. “Patsy, tell me!” she demanded when Patsy laughed harder. “Patsy! Stella said she had a carpet muncher at home!”

“Ya...” Patsy snickered, “her wife!”

Delia furrowed her brows in confusion.

“You know…” Patsy pointed in the general area of her womanhood, “she munches on her carpet.”

Delia’s eyes widened in shock.

“That’s too good,” Patsy wiped the tears that were trickling down her cheeks.

“Please don’t tell you friends I thought Stella’s wife was a vacuum…” Delia said softly.

“Don’t worry,” Patsy laughed, “that was too funny, I’m going to keep that one to myself.”

“Good,” Delia settled under the sheets and waited for her fiancée to calm down. She felt embarrassed and just as ignorant as she did when she was with Patsy’s friends, but she felt relieved that Patsy was willing to help her catch up to speed.

When Patsy finally contained herself, she naturally leaned in and gave her fiancée a peck on the lips. Delia returned her fiancée’s kiss and let Patsy spoon her naked old bottom. 

“I love you,” Patsy hummed.

“I love you too,” Delia smiled and closed her eyes as she settled in her fiancée’s arms.

They snuggled and slept nude for the first time in fifty years, just like the night Delia saw Patsy’s naked for the first time.

000

Patsy and Delia spent Sunday exploring the best that Bristol had to offer, and on Monday morning, Delia stayed in Patsy’s house while Patsy taught a lecture. It wasn’t a new concept for Delia, staying at home while her partner went to work. There was lots to do at Patsy’s house, and she would be home in a few hours. So Delia entertained herself on the desktop computer in Patsy’s office. She watched more YouTube videos, and eventually found herself on Facebook.

“Miss…” a soft knock came from the door.

“Hi Dot,” Delia gave the young woman a smile.

“I’m going to run errands at the farmer’s market, do you need anything, Miss?” Dot asked.

“Not that I can think of, thank you...” Delia smiled, “and please, just call me Delia.”

“Alright, Delia,” Dot smiled and began to retreat into the hallway.

“Oh wait!” Delia came to her senses, “Would you grab two haddock chips and marrowfat peas? I mean three, including yourself…” she glanced around the room and remembered her purse was in the living room. “Let me grab my wallet-”

“It’s all taken care of, Miss--Delia,” Dot chuckled. “Miss Mount gives me a credit card specifically for the groceries.”

“Right,” Delia breathed out.

“You just sit tight and I’ll be back with those fish and chips,” Dot smiled.

“Drive safe then, Dot…” Delia returned the smile and went back to her Facebook business.

000

“As you can see, the number needed to treat is six-point-two. In other words, your study would need to treat six patients to prevent one additional bad outcome. If we take it a step further and look at the…” Patsy lost her train of thought when she saw the screen of her smartphone light up on her podium. She tried to regain focus and turned towards her slideshow, trying desperately to ignore the message she just saw, but she could no longer contain the laughter that was building up inside of her. She glanced at her phone again and laughed out loud. “I’m sorry…” she told the lecture hall of three hundred, “I just taught my fiancée how to send pictures via Facebook message this weekend, and she appears to be sending me funny puppy pictures.”

The lecture hall full of nursing students filled with aw’s.

“Let’s just put that away…” Patsy tossed her phone into her purse and glanced up at the large projector.

“Don’t leave her hanging…” a student said from the front row.

Patsy couldn’t help but laugh again. “What does one reply to a picture of a chihuahua wearing a wig?” she asked, showing the first couple of rows the photo on her phone.

“A pug wearing trousers!” another student replied.

Patsy smirked and shook her head as she googled ‘pug wearing trousers’ and sent the photo to Delia. She couldn’t believe she was chatting with Delia through funny puppy pictures, and her students were telling her how to respond.

“Back to retrospective observational studies…” Patsy cleared her throat and glanced down at her phone when she saw it flash another message.

“What did she send back?” the same student asked.

Patsy opened the message and replied, “A dachshund in a hot dog costume,” she laughed. “I can’t beat that!”

“Send a boxer in a boxing costume!” a different voice called out.

“Okay, but this is the last one…” Patsy warned, “we have to get through today’s lecture so you can conduct your own randomized control trials on the therapeutic effects of puppy pictures.”

The nursing students chuckled.

“Sent…” Patsy locked her phone and tucked it into the pocket of her blazer, where it would be less of a distraction. She had an hour left of her lecture and she tried very hard to get through the content without interruption. Especially really cute, heart-warming, interruptions.

000

When Patsy returned home, she was greeted by the familiar smell of battered fish. She followed the scent into the dining room and found Delia waiting for her at the table.

“Welcome home,” Delia smiled.

“Hello Delia...” Patsy returned the smile, “how was your day?”

“Alright,” Delia shrugged, “How was yours?”

“It was good…” Patsy walked towards the table and sat down, “full of puppy pictures, which my class and I rather enjoyed.”

“Your class?” Delia gasped.

“Yes...” Patsy laughed, “it was rather entertaining, a nice break from intervention studies.”

Delia smiled and pushed a plate across the table towards Patsy.

“Are these…” Patsy picked up a chip and popped it into her mouth.

“Remember eating these in the chapel?” Delia asked.

“How could I forget?”

“Those were simpler times, hm? If we only knew how life would turn out then…” Delia took a chip into her mouth and gave her fiancée a smile.

Patsy placed a hand on the one Delia had on the table and began to eat the food Delia had plated for her.

“So I was thinking…” Delia began, “since I had a lot of time by myself to think today.”

“What were you thinking, Delia?” Patsy encouraged.

“Pats, how do you feel about living with me, once we’re married?”

“Move back to Poplar?” Patsy raised her eyebrows.

“I know my home isn’t as nice as any of yours, but it’s warm, and cozy, and it’s always full of love and laughter-” Delia sighed, “I’ve only been gone a couple of days and I already miss the laughter.”

“I’m sorry I left you here by yourself,” Patsy winced. “This house is boring compared to yours,” she added with a light laugh.

“Don’t be sorry, silly,” Delia reassured, “I volunteered to stay here while you worked. But would you consider moving back to Poplar with me?”

“I wouldn’t have to consider it,” Patsy told her lover with a small smile. “I let you walk out of my life before, I’m not letting you go again. Wherever you go, I’m coming with you.”

“So you’ll move in with me?” Delia asked with excitement.

“Of course,” Patsy smiled.

“BUt what about your work? Bristol is a ways away.”

“I suppose I could retire at the end of the school year,” Patsy thought out loud.

“Really?” Delia perked up.

“I think it’s about time...” Patsy admitted. “I only worked to keep busy, but I have you to keep me busy now… and Poppy, and Rosie, and Jim, and Tim…  _ and _ Lucy.”

Delia laughed. 

“And I think I’d rather like gardening with you...” Patsy added.

Delia smiled as she listened to Patsy talk about their future together.

“Most of all, I’m going to be busy keeping my wife happy,” Patsy concluded.

Delia laughed again. “Oh? I like the sound of that!”

000

Patsy drove Delia back to Poplar on Wednesday morning, just before her lecture at King’s College. Although Delia loved being in Bristol with Patsy, she missed her home and her nearby family.

“How was Bristol?” Rosie asked her grandmother.

“Fine,” Delia answered. She bounced Poppy on her knee and enjoyed her great-granddaughter’s company.

“We missed you this weekend,” Rosie admitted.

“I missed you all too…” Delia smiled, “I love Patsy, but her house is too quiet. I nearly lost my mind without you lot stopping by whenever you please.”

“Does she live on her own out there?” Rosie wondered.

“Just about…” Delia answered, “though she’s got a helper.”

“That must be nice.”

“It was alright,” Delia replied.

“So… mom wouldn’t shut-up about this being the first time we didn’t have Saturday lunch since-”

“My accident, I know,” Delia reassured. She gave Poppy a smile and tickled her belly.

“So are you going to be spending your weekends in Bristol now?” Rosie asked.

“I’d hope not,” Delia chuckled. “Actually, I’ve asked Patsy to come live with me,  _ here _ .”

“Oh,” Rosie perked up, “That would be lovely… and she’s okay with that?”

“She is,” Delia smiled. “She knows I can’t leave you lot.”

“We’d miss you too much,” Rosie confessed.

“I’d miss you all much more, cariad.”

“So is Patsy coming home here after her lecture?” Rosie asked.

“She is...” Delia smiled, “She’s going to start coming home,  _ here _ .”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More to come soon! Thank you for your patience and thank you for reading xoxo :)


	4. Chapter 4

~ Poplar, 2007 ~

“Welcome home!” Rosie and her husband Jim greeted in unison. Grandma Wallace stepped out of the newly repaired car with some assistance from her husband John and her daughter Lucy. Rosie held a homemade welcome banner in her hands, and Jim, a box of grandma Wallace’s favourite carrot cake, to celebrate the joyous occasion.

“Look who’s back from holiday in America, mum!” Lucy exclaimed as she supported her mother’s arm. Delia had been in hospital for nearly a month, and after weeks of continuous rehabilitation, she was physically well enough to come home to her family.

“Oh...” Delia smiled at the woman holding the beautifully crafted banner, “brilliant! Who are they, dear?” she asked Lucy.

“Our granddaughter Rosie and her new husband Jim,” John Wallace answered his wife’s question. “They just got back from their honeymoon. They travelled all over The States in a van, isn’t that right?”

“Yes, it’s me, mamgu…” Rosie lowered her head to meet her grandmother’s eyes, “your Rosie.”

“I’m afraid I don’t remember you, Dear, but I’m glad you had a good holiday,” Delia smiled at the young woman and continued to walk towards her home, an escort on each arm.

Rosie stood to her full height and stared blankly at her grandmother, watching her walk into the house she practically grew up in.

“That hurt...” she said softly.

“I’m sorry,” Jim wrapped an arm around his wife and gave her a firm and comforting hug.

“When mum said she had lost most of her memory, I didn’t think she’d forget me too…” Rosie winced in pain. Her heart hurt. Though she forced herself to stay strong and followed the parade towards her grandmother’s house behind the rest of the family.

“Whose house is this?” Delia asked as she walked through the front door.

“It’s our house, Delia...” John reminded, “we’ve lived here for forty years.”

“Oh…” Delia walked deeper into the home and took a seat on a chair in front of the television set.

“D-does she remember anything?” Rosie quietly asked her mother, her voice hoarse with sadness. 

“She remembers some of her early life...” Lucy informed, “mostly memories of growing up in Wales, and moving to London to attend nursing school.”

“So she doesn’t remember any of us?” Rosie dared to ask.

Lucy simply shook her head and gave her daughter the warmest hug she could. She felt like bursting into tears, again, but she stayed strong for Rosie, who was witnessing Delia’s condition for the first time.

“Will she ever remember?” Rosie finally cried.

“The doctors don’t know, she hit her head so hard…” Lucy sighed and rubbed her baby girl’s back to soothe her. She knew this was the worst thing Rosie could have came home to, after her month-long honeymoon.

“Excuse me!” Delia pointed at Jim.

“Me?” Jim pointed at himself and walked closer when his grandmother-in-law nodded.

“Yes, cadiad, have you got anything to eat?” Delia asked.

“Rosie and I brought you this cake…” Jim got down on one knee and opened the box in his hands. “Carrot cake, your favourite.”

Delia looked at the cake and began to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Jim couldn’t help but smile.

“We can’t eat cake for lunch,” Delia laughed again.

“I guess you’re right,” Jim chuckled. “What can I make you for lunch?”

“ _ You’re _ going to make  _ me _ lunch?” 

“I can…”

“You can cook?”

“Look at me…” Jim placed his hand on his belly, “of course I can.”

Delia chuckled. “I’ve never met a man who could cook before. Do you know how to make rarebit?”

Jim winced. “I’m not sure what that is,” he admitted.

“It’s a Welsh dish with bread and cheese sauce,” Rosie explained. “I can make you rarebit, mamgu,” she offered.

“The cupboards are empty, Rosie-love,” John informed sadly. “I’ve been at the hospital every day this week, I haven’t had the time to run to the shops.”

“That’s too bad,” Delia frowned with disappointment.

“I can run out and get some take-away...” Jim offered.

Delia’s features lit up into a smile when a memory came to her. She suddenly remembered the noodle house not to far from where she lived. “Oh, I’d love some Singapore Noodles!”

And so started Saturday luncheons at the Wallace home. Jim returned home with the food half an hour later, and the family gathered around the dining room table eating from noodle boxes. Delia was slowly remembering little bits and pieces of her home, and her family helped her recall memories by sharing stories from the past seventy years of her life.

Delia enjoyed listening to the stories as she ate, though the task was starting to become a struggle. She was able to eat her spring rolls with ease, but when it came to eating her noodles, it was obvious that she her brain injury had taken a toll on her fine motor skills. She tried her best to keep a hold on her fork, long enough to lift some noodles into her mouth, but her hand would give-out part way through and she would unintentionally drop the fork onto the table. Bits of noodles fell onto the table as well.

“Oh dear, I do apologise for the mess I’m making,” she told everyone at the table.

“Let me help you with that…” Rosie offered.

“That’s alright, cariad, I know I can do it…” Delia tried again with strong determination but her fine motor skills had yet to return to its pre-injury state.

“I think I know what she needs…” John stood from the table and went into the kitchen to grab a clean dish towel and a couple of rubber bands. He wrapped the towel around his wife’s fork and held it in place with the rubber bands, adding girth so Delia’s hand could grasp the utensil.

“That’s better…” Delia said when she could hold the fork with ease, “thanks, love.”

“That’s right,” John smiled, “I’m your love.”

“Are ya?” Delia laughed.

“Is that so hard to believe?” John teased.

Delia gave the man a wink and continued to eat her noodles. The man kept telling her he was her husband but she couldn’t recall getting married. He had even showed her an entire photo album of their wedding day, so she believed him, but she still had no recollection of the nature of their relationship.

“That’s a neat trick…” Jim commented.

“They had thick rubber grips at the hospital,” John mentioned as he sat back down. “It helped her a…” he suddenly paused mid-sentence and took a sharp breath.

“Are you alright, dad?” Lucy immediately saw the look of pain in her father’s eyes.

“Just my arthritis acting up,” John reassured with a forced smile. He ignored the pain in his bones, which had been getting worse since Delia was in the hospital. He figured the added stress of his wife’s accident was causing the intensifying pains all over his body.

“I like having you all here,” Delia smiled. “Will we have lunch again tomorrow?”

“They have to work, but the two of us will have lunch tomorrow, love,” John promised.

“Okay,  _ love _ ,” Delia smiled and gave her husband’s cheek a gentle pat. She was still having trouble recognizing the faces around the table, but she surely enjoyed their company.

John smiled and kissed the palm of Delia’s hand. “I’m so happy to have you home—I’m going to take good care of you,  _ love _ ,” he promised.

~ Poplar, 2010 ~

The sound of trumpets and the beat of a snare drum came from Patsy’s phone while the sound of Delia chopping vegetables and beef sizzling in the frying pan blended together.

Patsy was dancing to herself as she mashed potatoes, and she replaced her masher with a wooden spoon before holding it by her chin like a microphone.

“I’m so young and you’re so old, this my darling I’ve been told, I don’t care just what they say, ‘cause forever I will pray, you and I will be as free, as the birds up in the trees, OOOH, PLEEEASE STAAAY BY MEEE… DEEELIA.”

“It’s  _ Diana _ ,” Delia corrected with a laugh.

“Thrills I get when you hold me close...” Patsy continued to sing, “oh, my darling, you're the most, I love you but do you love me? Oh, Delia, can't you see? I love you with all my heart, and I hope we will never part, OOOH, PLEEEASE STAAAY WITH MEEE… DEEELIA.”

“You’re a fool,” Delia chuckled.

Patsy grasped her fiancée’s hips and danced as she sang, “Oh, my darling, oh, my lover, tell me that there... is no other, I love you... with my heart, oh-oh, oh-oh, oh don’t you know I love you, love you?”

Delia decided to play along and swayed her big old bottom against her fiancée’s body.

“So only you can take my heart, only you can tear it apart, when you hold me in your loving arms, I can feel you giving all your charms, hold me, darling, ho-ho-hold me tight, SQUEEZE me baby with all your might…”

“Christ!” Delia jumped when Patsy’s hand squeezed her bottom.

“OOOH, PLEAAASE STAAAY BY MEEE, DEEELIA... OOOH, PLEEEASE DELIAAA, OOOH, PLEASE DELIA…”

“I love you, you fool,” Delia laughed.

“Love you too,” Patsy smirked and gave her fiancée a kiss on the lips.

“Gosh, I haven’t heard that song in ages,” Delia reminisced. 

“Me too...” Patsy smiled, “yet I remember all of the lyrics.”

“One of your many talents,” Delia laughed and leaned in to kiss her lover, but the kitchen timer went off.

A moment later, the doorbell echoed through the house and the giddy pair quickly answered the door with excitement.

“Hello, I’m looking for a couple of old nurses…” an elderly woman with visibly silver hair tucked under a silk scarf stood at the door. Her large sunglasses and bright red lipstick were as identifying as her chirpy hello.

“Trixie!” Patsy and Delia squealed in unison.

The three women circled in a tight embrace.

“I’ve missed you, you old thing!” Patsy kissed her old roommate on both cheeks.

“Who are you calling old?” Trixie scoffed and then laughed.

“You haven’t changed one bit,” Delia commented.

“Neither have you two!” Trixie smiled and pulled her friends in for another round of hugs.

“Are those the midwives from Nonnatus?” a voice asked.

The three women turned around and saw another familiar face.

“Barbara!” Trixie, Patsy, and Delia squealed again.

Accompanied by her private nurse, Barbara, in a wheelchair, rolled towards her friends before they engulfed her in a tight embrace.

“Look at us, the gang back together!” Trixie sobbed tears of joy.

“It’s been a few years, hasn’t it?” Barbara chuckled.

“It’s so good to see you, both of you,” Delia exclaimed.

“Delia and I have been looking forward to this all week,” Patsy shared.

“Well then, shall we?” Trixie nodded towards the house.

“We shall,” Delia smiled and let her friends into her home before following them inside.

000

At the dining table, the four women had a chance to catch-up as they ate lunch.

Trixie, now a married woman with a grown step-daughter and a son of her own, had retired in Brighton with her husband, the dentist, Christopher Dockerill. 

Barbara, who had married the Poplar vicar, Tom Hereward, had three children, two grandchildren, and two great grandchildren. She remained a midwife with the order of Saint Raymond until she became ill with meningitis and septicaemia in her late thirties, which she luckily survived with only damage to her extremities. She had moved back to Liverpool with Tom to be closer to her parents, and she raised her family there with their help.

Of course, Patsy and Delia also filled their friends in on what they had been up to in the past fifty years. Patsy, with her move to Bristol, and Delia, who married John Wallace and was the only one to remain in Poplar after all these years.

“Is that Lucy now?” Barbara asked, indicating at a photo on the wall.

“Oh yes,” Delia smiled. “Can you believe she’s a grandmother now?”

“Gosh,” Barbara gasped, “I remember the night I caught her in my arms!”

“That’s right, you delivered her, Barbara!” Trixie remembered when Delia came to her prenatal clinic and said she might have been pregnant. Though it was Barbara who took on Delia’s case since Trixie had already had a full patient load.

“She was a bit of trouble, wasn’t she?” Barbara recalled with a laugh. “She really made me work hard for my money that night.”

“Was she breached?” Patsy asked.

“No—forcep baby,” Barbara replied.

“Poor thing came out looking like she had come from a bar fight,” Delia smiled at the memory of holding baby Lucy in her arms for the first time. It was the first time her heart felt full since she and Patsy tore apart. Lucy didn’t seem so big in her arms, but she was a solid nine pounds with blonde hair and John’s nose. She was bruised, from her rocky delivery, but she only cried for a moment. She was always a tough soul, even as a baby.

“John was too scared to hold her, said he was scared he’d touch one of her bruises and hurt her,” Barbara recalled.

“She’s always been daddy’s little girl,” Delia smiled.

“I remember the two of them getting into all sorts of trouble,” Trixie said with a laugh. “John took her into the clinic one time after they had been playing baseball, using a scrap piece of wood as a bat. Little Lucy ended up with splinters all over her hands!”

“I don’t remember that,” Delia replied with furrowed brows.

“Or maybe that was supposed to stay between the three of us,” Trixie gave Delia a guilty smile.

“Oh, John Wallace, bless his soul,” Delia sighed and laughed.

“Those were the days, weren’t they?” Barbara reminisced. “The children played all sorts of things on the streets while we ran clinics at the community centre or cycled around the district on our bicycles.”

“Our bicycles!” Patsy gasped, “I almost forgot about those ghastly things. They were top-of-the line back in those days, but they had no suspension and the seats were not nearly as cushioned as they needed to be.”

“I agree,” Trixie laughed.

“Though it was a lot better than walking on foot,” Barbara countered.

“Of course, we can’t forget the nuns keeping us in line,” Trixie added.

“The nuns…” Patsy’s lips formed a sad smile, “I suppose most of them are no longer with us…”

“I think only Sister Winifred and Mary Cynthia remain,” Delia informed. Only she remained in Poplar when the older nuns had their public funeral services, which were attended by nearly everyone in the community.

“Has anyone kept in touch with them?” Patsy asked.

“You can’t expect a pair of old nuns to have Facebook,” Trixie replied with a cheeky smile. “The last I heard from Sister Mary Cynthia, she was still on a mission in South Africa and decided to extend her stay.”

“I hope she’s well,” Patsy thought out loud.

“Me too,” Barbara agreed. “And I think Sister Winifred was called to the Mother House in the late 70s.”

“Do you recall the tall midwife? Gosh, I’m horrible, I can’t remember her name!” Patsy covered her mouth in shame.

“Chummy!” Trixie laughed, “I found her on Facebook a few years ago. She’s retired in Dover now. Her son Freddie just got married to his second wife, not too long ago.”

“Speaking of marriage,” Barbara glanced at her two friends,

“Yes, you two…” Trixie was more than ready to get the details on how her two friends, once secret lovers, were finally going to wed. “I want to know how it took you two fifty years to get engaged!”

“Did you always know, Trixie?” Delia asked curiously.

“Oh, Delia…” Trixie smirked, “Patsy and I shared more than just a bedroom-”

“You told her?” Delia asked Patsy with widened eyes. 

“I wouldn’t  _ dare _ tell anyone back in those days!” Patsy reassured.

“She didn’t have to, Delia,” Trixie promised. “We shared magazines. I would always talk about how dreamy the men were and Patsy here would skim right past them! Do you know how many times I’ve tried to set dear Patsy up with a gentleman friend? She always came home unimpressed— _ every _ time. At first I thought she was simply picky, but then I realised, nobody is  _ that  _ picky. It wasn’t that they were ‘too outspoken’, ‘too soft spoken’, or ‘lacking common interests’ that Patsy didn’t fancy them. She didn’t fancy them because they were men!”

Patsy and Delia glanced at each other and laughed.

“Actually...” Trixie continued, “when I realised you preferred women, I wondered what type of woman you’d fancy. I thought, maybe you’d like a tall stalky woman with big biceps—who wore men’s clothes and smoked cigars…”

Patsy couldn’t help but laugh.

“Then I thought: no, Trixie, that would be the type of woman  _ you  _ would fancy, if you were into women…” Trixie chuckled. “So I thought, maybe you were into women who were a bit more feminine, but not too feminine. A lady who wore dresses but drank her whisky neat and could fix a leak under the sink because she didn’t mind rolling up her sleeves and getting her hands dirty.”

Delia smirked at Trixie’s description. She did drink her whisky neat, back in those days.

“So when Delia came to fix the pipes at Nonnatus, that odd day Fred was ill with the flu, and I saw her under the kitchen sink in her pretty polka-dot dress… I had a feeling she didn’t just visit Nonnatus every now and then to drop off some Welsh cakes because she made too many...” Trixie laughed at the excuse because it was, in fact, brilliant. None of the residents, nuns nor nurses, at Nonnatus House would ever refuse cake. “She came by to see  _ you! _ ”

“Why didn’t you tell me you knew, Trixie?” Patsy wondered.

“You were the closest thing I had to a sister, Patsy. I hoped you trusted me enough to tell me when  _ you _ were ready. Plus, I might have had a drop of doubt in my mind and I couldn’t bear the embarrassment if I had approached you about it, and it turned out that Delia really was just horrible at measuring ingredients and she always baked way more cakes than she intended.”

The ladies all had a little laugh.

“But, of course, there were all those times you cancelled plans with me to see Delia,” Trixie added. “You so obviously preferred her company to mine, but it was the spring in your step, and the notable smile on your face, that practically screamed you had a crush on a special someone… and we all know it wasn’t the tall handsome barista at The Silver Buckle.”

Patsy blushed, feeling a little put on the spot. She felt Delia place a comforting hand on her lap and she gave her future wife a grateful smile.

“I knew you two were an item when I caught Delia leaving Nonnatus, early one morning...” Barbara confessed.

“You saw me?” Delia replied with a faint gasp.

“I was coming home at about five in the morning, just before dawn, and I saw you coming out the front door. I didn’t realise it was you, at first, but then I recognised your St. John’s Ambulance uniform, and I watched you give Patsy a little wave from her window before you ran off.”

“Where was I?” Trixie wondered. 

“You were working nights,” Patsy answered. She had Trixie’s schedule memorised so she knew when she could have Delia over or run to the nurse’s home, unnoticed.

“It was like watching Romeo say goodbye to Juliette,” Barbara shared.

“Gosh, we weren’t as subtle as we thought we were...” Delia laughed, a little embarrassed. She had nothing to be embarrassed about, especially not now, but she still had feelings of shame from years of being closeted to undo.

“I can feel the anxiety now, just from the mere mention of those memories,” Patsy admitted. “I didn’t pray very much, but I sure prayed every time one of us had to sneak out like that—I prayed we wouldn’t get caught.”

“That was risqué,” Barbara praised. “What would you have done if one of the nuns  _ did _ find you leaving at that time?”

“Oh, we had a ready list of excuses,” Delia shared with a smirk. “Like, I was teaching Pats a card game to teach the cubs when I fell ill and was too weak to walk home—or I had come to ask Patsy for help with some sewing, since everyone knew I was a terrible seamstress, and we lost track of time and it was far too late at night for little me to walk home alone.”

“Gosh, you two had to go through so much to be together back in those days…” Barbara commented.

“One might say it was too much…” Delia said sadly. It was that very reason—the sneaking around, waiting for opportunities to meet-up, and even going weeks without seeing each other—that she broke up with a Patsy, fifty years ago. It was exhausting and it felt like there was no end to their secrecy. Especially not in 1960.

Patsy slipped her hand under the table and took one of Delia’s hands into her own. They were together now and that’s all that mattered.

“But the next thing I knew, you were getting married to John Wallace and Patsy had accepted a job in Bristol. It all happened so fast!” Barbara admitted.

“We got engaged so fast, my mother hopped on the first bus to London after she read my letter to give me a spanking. She assumed I had gotten myself pregnant by a man I had only known a couple of months.” Delia recalled, laughing internally. “But I wasn’t pregnant—just eager to be a wife and start a family.”

“I didn’t know how to cope with it so I took the first job out of town that I could,” Patsy added.

“I was a bit hurt, actually...” Trixie informed Patsy. “You didn’t tell me you were planning on leaving, or that you and Delia had a falling-out. I really could have been there for you...”

“I didn’t tell anyone I was leaving because I couldn’t say  _ why _ I was really leaving...” Patsy shook her head, “and it would have been too hard to say goodbye.”

“You didn’t say goodbye at all,” Trixie said sadly.

“I’m sorry…” Patsy apologised, “you too were like a sister to me, Trixie, and I just left you without an explanation.”

Trixie gave her friend an understanding smile and reached out to hold her hand.

“I think we all figured it out after Delia’s wedding...” Barbara told them with a hint of sadness, “even the nuns.”

“Even the nuns?” Patsy asked in surprise.

“I think Sister Monica Joan might have blurted it out during lunch, the next morning...” Barbara tried to recall what the old nun had said that stuck in her memory after all these years. “She said something about how unfortunate it was that Delia married someone who didn’t love her as much as Patsy did… she might have even cursed the rules of the church for prohibiting your love, because, if you could marry who you really wanted to marry, then you wouldn’t have run off to Bristol.”

“I suppose it was quite obvious. Everyone knew how close we were and I didn’t have the decency to show up to the wedding...” Patsy lowered her head in shame.

“Nurse Crane tried to maintain your secret and proposed that perhaps you left Poplar because you were jealous Delia was marrying a man  _ you _ loved,” Trixie reassured Patsy.

“But Sister Monica Joan told her she could recognise love when she sees it,” Barbara added.

“What a mess we made at Nonnatus,” Delia told her fiancée, half-jokingly.

“Gosh, I didn’t mean for lunch to take such a dark turn…” Trixie winced.

“But I’m glad we talked about it,” Patsy admitted. She always wondered what happened at Nannatus after her departure.

“On a much brighter note…” Barbara decided it was time to change topic, “you two are finally getting married!”

Patsy and Delia smiled and began to tell their friends how they reconnected on Facebook after fifty years apart.

000

After lunch, Trixie and Barbara headed home to Brighton and Liverpool, respectively. Patsy offered her flat for them to stay the night in London, but the two women kindly declined and made the journey back to their families. Trixie drove herself, and Barbara made the comfortable commute by train, accompanied by her private nurse.

Later that evening, as the sun began to set, Patsy had the sudden urge to visit Nonnatus House. Feeling nostalgic after reminiscing with her old friends, she wanted to see the old convent where she spent some of her earliest and best years as a midwife.

“You know, Delia…” Patsy started speaking as if she was going to ask a favour, “I’ve lived in Poplar all of one week and I still haven’t had the chance to walk over and see Nonnatus House.”

“It’s changed quite a bit,” Delia informed. “The church came into some money and renovated it in the seventies. They’ve had to change the windows and repair the roof, but the big front door and the front steps are the same, I believe.”

“Let’s go see it,” Patsy proposed.

“Right now?”

“Yes!” Patsy answered with a big smile, “Before the sun sets.”

000

“There it is…” Patsy took a deep breath and took in her surroundings. The big door and the front steps were exactly as she remembered it. She couldn’t believe how easily she had walked out the door and down the steps fifty years ago. She ran away from the only place that felt like home since her childhood in Singapore. 

“You know, John and I used to walk laps around this old convent,” Delia shared with a laugh. “Every time I got pregnant, I went past my due date. None of our children wanted to come out. So each time, the midwife would suggest going on walks to get the labour going, and each time, John would take me on walks around and around Nonnatus. He said it was a good place to walk, in case I went into labour. All he would have to do is yell and a midwife would come running out,” Delia laughed again. “So the two of us would walk round and round and round… well, John would walk. I would slowly wobble like a duck with swollen feet—but he always waited for me, always held my hand.”

“He sounds lovely,” Patsy said with a genuine smile. She pictured young and pregnant Delia wobbling around the old convent and it made her chuckle.

“Oh, he was, Pats. He was ever so patient and so kind, though sometimes stubborn. He was the type of man who would see a girl crying at a cafe and offer to buy her a slice of cake—and send one her way anyway after she’d declined.”

“And I’m the type of woman who makes a girl leave a coffee shop crying...” Patsy added, half-teasing.

“You were a fool,” Delia corrected, also half-teasing. “We were both fools,” she reassured.

“The biggest fools,” Patsy laughed and held Delia’s hand as they walked closer to the old convent.

A sign caught Delia’s attention and she approached the pillar to read the notice pasted onto it. “It’s going to be demolished...” she said sadly. She suddenly remembered all the times she came to Nonnatus to drop off Welsh cakes, and the evenings she was invited over for drinks with Patsy, Trixie, Barbara, and sometimes even Nurse Crane. She even recalled eating fish and chips in the chapel one time and she thought God would reach down from the heavens and smite her himself. She truly had some good memories at the old convent.

“And turned into luxury flats?” Patsy guessed.

“Mhmm,” Delia breathed out.

Patsy sighed and pointed up. “That used to be my window...”

“I remember,” Delia said. How could she forget looking up above and bidding her lover goodbye before running off to the nurse’s home?

“Let’s go in,” Patsy suggested.

“What?” Delia gasped.

“One last time,” Patsy encouraged.

“No, Pats, are you crazy?” Delia protested.

“I just want to see it... one last time,” Patsy pleaded.

“It’s been abandoned for years, who knows what creatures live in there!”

“If it doesn’t look safe, we’ll turn back,” Patsy promised. “Please?” she pouted.

Delia shook her head in denial but she eventually caved in. Deep down, she too wanted to see the old convent  _ one last time _ .

The door was locked and Patsy picked it with a kirby grip from her hair—which she had broken into two pieces.

“I’m not even going to ask why you know how to do that...” Delia shook her head in disapproval but smirked with pride. She thought people only picked locks in movies. She didn’t think it would actually work.

“Joan taught me. When her neighbour reported her and Ellen to the College of Midwives, we broke into the clinic record room and borrowed some of their files for a few days so we could stall their release process. They needed time to at least apply for another job so they wouldn’t lose her home.” 

“You  _ are _ a dark horse…” Delia said with a laugh. She could not believe how her keep-in-line-and-follow-the-rules Patsy had turned into such a helpful type of rule-bender.

Patsy stood to her full height and opened the door. “Follow behind me...”  she said as she stepped in. She held her phone out in front of her, using it as a torch, and held Delia’s hand behind her. They walked into the empty convent and she saw that it had been renovated, like Delia had mentioned. What used to be walls lined with patterned wallpaper now had solid light grey drywall. The old staircase, which once had dark wooden rails, now had modern metal ones.

“It looks so different...” Delia breathed out.

“It does,” Patsy nodded and shined her torch around them.

The interior was very dusty—and filled with old broken furniture, as if it was used as a storage unit during its last days—but free of rodents and pests, which Delia had feared. They were able to take a tour, and they shared some of their favourite memories along the way. Like luncheons in the dining room, the evenings they drank tea and shared stories in the kitchen, and the days they watched programs from the old television set with Sister Monica Joan. There were also the few times Delia came over to help Patsy prepare crafts and activities for the cubs, and other times when she simply came over to hold her through the cold nights. They missed the rest of their friends, and the thrill of their youth, but they also felt relieved to live in the world they lived in now. The world where they could hold hands in public and declare civil partnership. 

Since the old nurse’s home had been completely demolished, Nonnatus House was the last remaining structure that Patsy and Delia both considered home. Though Delia never lived at the convent, anywhere with Patsy felt like home. So they appreciated Nonnatus House, one last time, until red and blue flashing lights halted their trip further down memory lane.

000

Patsy had never been in the back of a police car before, but for Delia, being driven around town by an on-duty Lucy was a regular occurrence. They were in trouble. Luckily, when they got to the police station, one of the policemen recognised Delia and called Lucy.

Twenty minutes later, Lucy arrived in time to see her mother and her mother’s fiancée sitting in an interrogation room. Drinking tea and eating cookies.

“I am quite disappointed in your behaviour… the both of you,” Lucy scolded, having to meet the two old ladies at her place of work, of all places.

Patsy and Delia looked at each other and began to giggle. Mostly from the relief that they weren’t going to be charged with trespassing, but also at the ridiculousness of being held in police custody for the first time at their ripe old age.

“Stop laughing,” Lucy demanded. “This isn’t funny. I cannot believe I had to come to work on my  _ one  _ night off this week to pick-up my seventy-three year old mother and her fiancée.”

“We were only reminiscing,” Delia defended.

“Exploring a crumbling old building like a teenage delinquent?” Lucy huffed, “Are you onto your second midlife crisis, mother?”

“Second?” Patsy glanced at Delia and had another fit of giggles.

“You’re not helping,” Lucy directed at Patsy. “Ever since you’ve turned up she’s been running off like a love-struck teenager!”

“Don’t talk to her like that!” Delia defended her fiancée.

“It’s fine,” Patsy reassured, understandingly. “Lucy, I know this was an inconvenience for you, but your mother and I are adults, we’re allowed to make mistakes.”

“No you’re not!” Lucy finally snapped, “What if the rotten floors had crumbled beneath you? What if the old ceiling caved in? Mistakes can cost lives, Patsy. The last time mistakes were made, mum ended up in hospital with her head cracked open and her mind half gone!”

Both Patsy and Delia went silent, and so did the few people at the police station who overheard the outburst.

“I’m sorry, mum,” Lucy huffed and closed the door to the interrogation room to give them some privacy from her co-workers. “I know Patsy makes you happy, but I can’t bear the thought of you two driving around the country in her fancy car, or going on these reckless adventures. It’s too risky.”

Delia sighed at the tight hold her daughter had on her leash. It reminded her of how her own mother treated her when she was but a young lady. “I know we made a mistake tonight, but I can’t stay locked up in my house forever, Lucy. That’s no way to live the rest of my life,” Delia reminded.

“I can’t go through all that again, mum,” Lucy shook her head. “I can’t watch you get hurt again—I can’t have you running around with Patsy. I’m sorry, I’m putting my foot down.”

“Lucy!” Delia cried out in protest. She wanted to tell her she was a grown woman who could make her own decisions, but she didn’t. She owed Lucy so much. Lucy took care of her every day when she couldn’t remember her own name. Delia knew it would break Lucy if she snapped her leash and ran off to be with Patsy.

“I’m sorry, Lucy, it was wrong of me to take us in there…” Patsy began to defend herself, “but we were going to turn back if it looked unsafe. Besides, nobody got hurt-”

“Only by the grace of God!” Lucy told Patsy in a harsh tone, her built-up frustration breaking through the dam that held it all in. “You have no idea what it was like when we nearly lost her, you have no idea how hard it was to watch her suffer. You weren’t there,  _ you _ didn’t work yourself to death taking care of her, my father did!”

Patsy looked at Delia and then dropped her gaze on to the floor beneath her. At least now she knew why Lucy resented her.

“Lucy…” Delia called her daughter’s name calmly her firmly. She was embarrassed at how Lucy treated her fiancée. She never raised any of her children to be nasty.

Even Lucy blushed and felt embarrassed by what she had said and how it came out. She wasn’t that kind of person, but it seemed that circumstances had lead her to be that way.

“If I killed your father, then your issue is not with Patsy, it’s with me,” Delia informed.

“You didn’t kill him… I didn’t mean it like that,” Lucy said one thing but the pain in her eyes said otherwise.

“Well, I think I did,” Delia admitted.

“Don’t say that, mum,” Lucy closed her eyes and shook her head. Now it pained her to hear that her mother blamed herself for her father’s death. Even if a part of her felt that way.

“If he wasn’t so busy taking care of me, after the accident, he wouldn’t have ignored his symptoms…” Delia gulped to try to relieve the sudden dryness in her throat. There wasn’t a day that went by that she didn’t think this.

“It was two bad things happening at once...” Lucy reassured, “it was out of our control.”

“I think you haven’t fully forgiven me for his death and that’s why you can’t accept that I’ve moved on,” Delia confessed.

Lucy remained silent.

“Now you think I’m going to marry someone new and forget about your dad and all of the great things he’s done for us.”

Lucy finally shed a tear. “It’s not fair…” she took a shaky breath and sighed.

“I know it’s not fair that he’s gone, cariad…”

“But Tim was able to let go, Peter acts like nothing has happened, and you’re onto your second marriage! Everyone has moved on except for  _ me _ . I’m still mourning…” Lucy covered her face with her hands to hide the tears that were streaming down her cheeks.

Delia could see that her daughter was still in so much pain, and it broke her heart. “Oh, sweetheart…” she sighed and approached her daughter to wrap her arms around her. “I know it’s especially hard for you, you two were so close...”

“I feel like he just died yesterday, mum.” Lucy crumbled into her mother’s arms.

“I know,” Delia soothed.

Lucy’s pain and anger reminded Patsy of when she lost her mother and sister. She wanted to help Lucy, to have a talk with her about coping with grief, but she didn’t think Lucy was ready to open her heart to her quite yet. So she remained quiet.

“I miss him so much,” Lucy cried.

“I know,” Delia tightened her hold around her daughter. “But your dad wouldn’t want you to be this miserable, Luce. He would have wanted you to be happy. All he ever wanted was to see you happy. Do you know how much he hated Jelly Tots?”

“What?” Lucy lifted her head and looked at her mother with pink eyes. She didn’t think she heard right.

“He hated how it got stuck in his teeth,” Delia said with a nod.

“But he... would always buy them and share them with me.” 

“He knew how much you liked them, and he loved seeing your little face brighten up whenever he took the bright yellow package out of his jacket pocket.”

Lucy sighed and felt a bittersweet feeling in her heart. She loved her mother, but she and her father were best of friends. She suddenly remembered him and their favourite memories together, and she began to cry some more. She was a grown woman, but she felt like a little girl who’d just lost her Papa.

“Can I ask you a question?” she asked her mother after a moment.

“Of course,” Delia nodded.

“Would you have let Patsy back into your life, if dad was still alive?”

Delia took a deep breath and thought carefully about her answer. She looked at Patsy, who was awkwardly watching everything unfold. “I think I would have-” she began to answer.

“You would have left dad—after everything that’s happened—for Patsy?” Lucy huffed.

“You didn’t let me finish,” Delia defended. “I would have let her back into my life as a friend, as hard as that would be for both of us. But I couldn’t just leave your father, not after what we’ve given each other and what we’ve been through. I vowed to be with him ‘till death do us part.”

Patsy gave her fiancée an understanding smile. If John  _ was  _ still alive, like she thought he was when Delia first sent her that Facebook message, she would have been happy to have Delia back in her life as a friend. She may have had a history of sleeping around, but she swore to herself she wouldn’t be a homewrecker.

“So it’s pretty convenient that he died when he did, isn’t it?” Lucy asked. “Now you have a chance to be yourself and be with the person you really wanted to be with...”

“I still lost a spouse that day, Lucy,” Delia countered with a hint of anger. “I still lost the father of my children and a dear friend who vowed to take care of me as I vowed to do the same for him. We may not have had the passion or lust that comes more naturally to others, but love grew between us and it was undeniably there…” Delia took a deep breath to calm her anger. “He gave me the greatest gift a man could give me and I’ll be damned if you think a day goes by that I’m not grateful for your father.”

Lucy lowered her head and avoided her mother’s gaze.

“I know you feel like I’m moving on, but there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about your dad. And I think… I think he would want me to be happy. Whether that’s with Patsy or another person. That’s all he ever wanted, for all of us to be happy.”

Lucy glanced at Patsy, who was avoiding her gaze and had taken an interest in the remaining tea in her teacup.

“Patsy makes me happy, can’t I be happy?” Delia asked softly.

Lucy remained silent in thought.

A knock came from the door and Sasha opened it with an apologetic look.

“Hate to break up your little family conference but I just arrested a couple of hooligans for robbing Carson’s Convenience again so I’m gonna need this room for actual criminals.”

The three women looked at each other and, despite the tension in the room, could not help but laugh through tears. They were so caught up on their family drama that they had forgotten they were free to leave the police station a while ago.

000

Lucy drove her mother and Patsy the short distance back to the Wallace home in her own car, a little blue Toyota Yaris, which was nice as Patsy and Delia didn’t need to ride another cop car that night.

The drive was silent, for the most part, until Lucy parked the car by the curb of her mother’s house.

“Lucy…” Delia sighed.

“I owe you and Patsy an apology...” Lucy said before her mother could say more. The short drive really cooled her off and she remembered the person she used to be before Patsy came into their lives, and even before her father died. It wasn’t the same person she was now. “I’m sorry I said those hurtful things back at the police station. I didn’t realise how angry I’ve become since you’ve gotten engaged, or since dad died. I think it’s something I need to talk to someone about—professionally—to help me cope.”

Delia reached out and took her daughter’s hand into her own. “I think that’s very brave of you to decide for yourself.”

Lucy unbuckled her seat belt and turned her upper body to look at Patsy in the back seat. “Patsy, you make my mother happy, and I should be happy that she’s happy, but I’m not quite there yet. I’m sorry I can’t share that happiness right now, but I’m going to try...”

“I understand,” Patsy nodded her head. “I was just as angry when I lost my mother and sister at the camp—when we were prisoners of war.”

“I’m sorry,” Lucy winced.

“It hurts...” Patsy empathised, “but hurting others because you’re hurting doesn’t make the pain go away.”

Lucy closed her eyes and nodded her head, a few tears trickling down her cheeks.

“I think it’s very big of you to recognise what you need and I support your decision to talk to someone. If you need us to come with you for any family sessions, we shall make the time,” Patsy promised. She took a tissue from the box tucked in the back pouch of Delia’s seat and handed it to her future step-daughter.

“Ta..” Lucy wiped her tears.

“Luce…” Delia called her daughter, “I’m sorry for my accident, and I’m sorry I’m likely the reason why your father isn’t with us today.”

“It wasn’t your fault that the other driver was intoxicated,” Lucy said softly.

“Right, but I appreciate how you’ve taken care of me, so thank you.”

Lucy gave her mother’s hand a squeeze. “You don’t have to thank me, mum. We’re Wallace’s, we take care of our own because that’s what we do.”

“But I’m sorry I put you through so much, Lucy…” Delia apologised softly, “I’m sorry you’ve had to take care of me these past three years—it’s taken a big toll on you and I’m sorry. I’m your mum, I should be taking care of you!”

“You  _ have _ been a handful,” Lucy joked lightly.

“I can’t promise more bad things won’t happen...” Delia continued, “because they happen whether we’re careful or not. But we can’t live our lives in fear, that’s no way to live.”

Patsy glanced at her fiancée and gave her a sad smile.

“Lucy…” Patsy said softly, “I’m sorry I took your mother into an abandoned building. We’ll be more responsible next time… and we’ll try our best not to end up at the police station again.”

Lucy sighed and looked at Patsy with some understanding. “Just try your best to keep her safe, please. She’s the only parent I’ve got left.”

Patsy nodded in agreement. “I promise.”

000

The next morning, Patsy left Poplar to drive back to Bristol and teach a lecture. She had a long commute ahead of her and she reminded herself that the sacrifice was worth spending more time with Delia—even if the London traffic made her an hour late and she arrived to an empty lecture hall.

“Did you cancel your lecture, Doctor Mount?” the head of the department, a woman named Martha, asked from the side door of the empty lecture hall.

“No,” Patsy breathed out, “I got caught in traffic coming out of London.”

“I see… I thought I noticed a herd of disappointed nursing students tickle past my office…”

“It won’t happen again,” Patsy promised.

“Is everything alright with you, Pats?” Martha asked, more as a friend than a superior.

“Just having an off day,” Patsy promised. First, she was arrested for the first time in her life last night. Now, she was late for a lecture for the first time in her life. Perhaps she was having an odd week full of bad firsts.

“Well, I sure hope this isn’t a new pattern…”

“Of course not,” Patsy promised.

“Good,” Martha smiled and began to walk away.

“Actually, Martha, while I have you here…” Patsy called out.

Martha turned around and gave the professor her full attention.

“I might as well tell you sooner than later—I plan to retire at the end of the semester.” Patsy initially though she wanted to retire at the end of the academic year, thinking this would be her last lap around the University of Bristol as a professor, but after a week of living in Poplar and having to drive two hours to get to work, she couldn’t imagine commuting for another full semester. So she decided a half-lap to end her career would do.

“Oh,” Martha’s eyebrows raised in surprise, but then she gave Patsy a warm smile. “I’d hate to see you leave, Patsy, but you deserve a happy retirement after all these years.”

“I think it’s time,” Patsy smiled.

“I’ll make sure we send you off the right way-”

“Oh, that won’t be necessary,” Patsy reassured.

“Oh, but we must! You’ve dedicated  _ decades _ to this university-”

“I know...” Patsy smiled with a hint of sadness, “and I’d like to leave quietly, if I may. It’s already hard enough to leave everyone. I’ve grown so fond of this place… but it’s time to start the next chapter of my life.”

Martha gave her colleague an understanding smile. “Why now? I mean, what finally made the notorious Doctor Mount decide to retire?”

Patsy couldn’t help but smile at the thought of retiring and spending her days with Delia. “I need to do something I should have done fifty years ago,” she replied.

Martha gave her a questioning look.

“I’m going to get married,” Patsy said with pride.

Martha’s eyebrows raised in surprise, again, but then her features softened into a genuine smile. “Patsy… I didn’t even know you were engaged, congratulations!”

“Thank you,” Patsy smiled. “And it’s been long overdue, much like my retirement,” she added with a laugh.

“Gosh, you’re right, you’ve put off your retirement for twelve years!” Martha could recall when she was a new hire and Patsy stepped down from being the department head and, instead of retiring, decided to teach again.

“Well…” Patsy smirked, “I’ve put getting married off for fifty years so I think I have a bad habit of putting things off that I need to unlearn.”

000

Patsy had other business to take care of in Bristol, after her lecture. First was getting the ball rolling on selling her property. She wouldn’t need the big empty house in Bristol if she was living in Poplar with Delia. And she still couldn’t believe she was going back to live where her midwifery career started.

Second was giving her helper, Dot, her notice of release. Dot, who had spent the majority of the past month taking care of little Coco and maintaining the property, would have to find work elsewhere now that Patsy didn’t live there. But for the time being, she was free to continue living on the property, so long as she kept it presentable for potential buyers. Of course, Dot didn’t mind this arrangement at all. This also meant that Patsy would have to take Coco home, which she had yet to discuss with Delia, but hoped she would be okay with since Coco was already in the back seat of her car, ready to be taken home to Poplar.

By the time Patsy started her two hour drive back to Poplar, it was late in the evening and she called Delia to tell her not to wait up to have supper. Of course, Delia protested but Patsy insisted she have her supper since it was unpredictable how long the drive would truly take through London traffic. Patsy promised her fiancée, who was worried about Patsy going hungry—even for a moment—that she would grab a bite to eat on the way home. So she stopped for a veggie wrap and a fruit smoothie, which was easy enough to eat on her drive.

It was just past nine when Patsy arrived and she used her key to open the door to their home. And it really did feel like home. As soon as she walked inside, she saw Delia in the kitchen, dressed in a comfortable pair of pastel pink floral pyjamas, brewing something on the stovetop.

“Delia…” Patsy smiled and dropped her work bag on the floor by the breakfast table. Delia looked adorable and comfortable in her nightwear.“You waited up…” she said with a grateful smile.

“You think I can head to bed without you?” Delia scoffed and smiled when Patsy stole a quick kiss.

Coco gave Delia a cheerful bark, and Delia raised her eyebrows in surprise.

“I’ve decided to let Dot go so I had to take Coco home… I hope that’s okay.”

“Of course that’s okay,” Delia smiled and gave the little dog a pat, “I’ve always wanted a dog in the house but John and Peter were allergic.”

“Oh good,” Patsy sighed in relief. “You hear that, Coco? We don’t have to find a motel to stay at until Delia changes her mind.”

Delia playfully rolled her eyes.

“What are you making?” Patsy asked, glancing into the saucepan.

“Bournvita... with a tot of Johnnie Walker in it.”

“Gosh, that really takes me back…” Patsy wrapped her arms around her lover and recalled the days in the nurse’s home when Delia would wait for her to come home from an evening shift and share a night cap.

“Let’s see if it still tastes the same…” Delia poured their drinks into two mugs and nodded her head towards the living room couch.

Patsy took her cue and they both headed over to sit down and unwind. Coco also followed her moms into the living room and rested on the dog bed Patsy had brought home from Bristol.

“How was work?” Delia started. She took a sip of her drink and snuggled closer to her fiancée.

“Alright…” Patsy took a sip of the warm drink and let it soothe her body. She decided not to tell her fiancée about being an hour late to her lecture, or her chat with the department head. Not for the time being. At that moment, after the rough couple of days she’d been through, she simply wanted it all to be about Delia. “How was lunch with Tim?” she changed the subject.

“Fine. He’s been working lots, trying to distract himself from everything that’s happening to him right now.”

“I’ve been there...” Patsy could relate. She was an expert at using work to distract herself from heartbreak.

“So I’ve been thinking…” Delia said with a little mischievous grin.

“What were you thinking, Delia?” Patsy played along.

“Here I am, telling Lucy that life is short and playing it safe is no way to live the rest of my life, and I still haven’t had the courage to make love to you…” Delia took two big gulps of her drink and said, “I think I’m ready to change that.”

“Are you?” Patsy smiled, sounding playful but not too eager—even though she was.

“It’s been a really,  _ really _ , long time…” Delia blushed. “But I think I still remember how to...” she added with a smirk.

Patsy’s smile grew bigger and she gasped when Delia pushed her back against the cushions and pressed their lips together.

~ London, 1972 ~

Patsy didn’t know how, but she ended up at a woman’s apartment after the rally at Hyde Park. Ellen and Joan said they would pick her up in a couple hours, and Patsy’s mind was already anticipating her pick-up time. She was so anxious she could barely enjoy the woman’s company.

“Have you?” the woman asked, appearing to have asked for the second time.

“I’m sorry,” Patsy shook her head to clear her thoughts.

The woman gave Patsy an understanding smile. She had asked if Patsy had read any of the books on her bookshelf, but quickly decided to drop the topic since Patsy was obviously uninterested.  “Have you ever been with a woman?” she asked.

“I have...” Patsy blushed, “but that was over a decade ago.”

“Over a decade?” the woman gasped, “How did you survive it?”

“Well, there isn’t really a line-up of willing women, especially not in my town...” Patsy brought her glass to her lips and took a sip of her cocktail. Now she remembered meeting the woman, Vera, she thinks she’s called, and agreeing to go up to her apartment to borrow one of her queer books.

“Have you ever had sex casually?” Vera asked.

“No,” Patsy shook her head in denial.

“Would you like to?”

Patsy gulped nervously and eventually followed Vera into the bedroom, where Vera became the first of the thirty women Patsy would sleep with after her break-up with Delia.

000

On the east end of London, Delia found herself in the deep groove of an old habit. While the children were at summer camp at the community centre, and John was at work, she locked herself in her bedroom where she appreciated one of John’s adult magazines.

Almost twelve years had passed since she had been with a woman, twelve years since she had been with Patsy, and as much as she told herself she was happy to be with John, there was always something missing.

So she shut the blinds, opened the magazine, and let the pictures spark her imagination and fill the void.

~ Poplar, 2010 ~

Heavy breaths filled the living room and the subtle creaking of the couch slowly subsided. The two bodies went limp. Patsy, against one arm rest, and Delia, on top of her lover.

“Was that okay?” Delia asked.

Patsy huffed and then laughed. Her body still buzzed from the high she just experienced. It was, in fact, a lot more than  _ okay _ .

“You’re right...” Delia laughed along, “it’s like riding a bike—you never forget.”

“If anything…” Patsy paused to catch her breath, “I think all that time you’ve had to play with yourself has helped you get better!”

Delia looked up at her lover and smiled. “I think you’ve gotten better too... must be from all the practice you got with those thirty women,” she teased.

Patsy playfully rolled her eyes and tangled her fingers in Delia’s hair. She combed it back and played with Delia’s hair, much like she used to after they made love.

“Gosh…” Delia’s head perked up and ducked just as quickly as she lifted it.

“What?” Patsy furrowed her brows.

“The curtains weren’t drawn…” Delia winced and glanced towards the window that spanned behind the couch.

Patsy looked up at the window and began to laugh.

“Patsy!” Delia shrieked, though she couldn’t help but laugh along. “I have neighbours! Lucy lives across the street! What if someone had a peek while they were walking by?”

“Lucy hasn’t called, so you know she hasn’t seen anything,” Patsy suggested. “And I think anyone in the right state of mind would have looked away as fast as they looked in, if they saw two naked grannies rolling on top of each other.” 

Delia digested Patsy’s words and then shrugged, “I suppose you’re right...”

Patsy laughed. “Can you believe, fifty years ago, how terrifying it was to even hold hands in the shadows of this town? And here we are now, making love for all of Poplar to see!”

Delia blushed and then laughed again.

“Want to make love again?” Patsy asked with a smirk.

Delia arched an eyebrow and reached up to pull the curtain closed. 

000

Delia woke up in the middle of the night to a light buzzing noise. Having been a mother, her ears were easily roused and attentive to trouble. She lifted her head from Patsy’s chest and realised they had fallen asleep on the couch, and that the offender was Patsy’s phone vibrating persistently against the coffee table. She reached for it, with the intention to give it to Patsy, but the screen caught her eye.

_ Incoming call: Jodie<3 _

Delia furrowed her brows when she saw the photo of Patsy locking lips with a much younger woman.

The light on the backside of Patsy’s phone flashed repeatedly to notify the incoming call, and the persistent flickering of the light made Delia’s head spin suddenly. She noticed that it was well past midnight and she realised she was so caught-up in making love to Patsy that she forgot to take her night time pills.

“Pats…” Delia managed to rouse her fiancée before collapsing on Patsy’s chest and convulsing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I thank you for your patience in waiting for this update and, as always, thanks for reading and I hope you liked it :)


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